Interview with Justine Alter Upon the Release of Her Second Book

Three years after the release of Outside of the World, we sat down with Justine Alter to discuss her new release How Could I Possibly Convert to Orthodox Christianity? A Book for Psychics, Magicians, Diasporic Religious Practitioners, and Infiltrators.

What are you trying to do with this book that hasn’t already been done with Outside of the World?

Outside of the World was about my own understanding of my life up until age 26. It’s raw, displays a youthful immaturity, but most importantly, it also ends as I’m still trying to navigate life with the remnants of my sensuous perception. It does not discuss the mechanics of psychism as a demonic deception. It could be potentially relatable for people from that background, but it does not point to the saints and their explanation of this condition as much as I would have liked, retrospectively.

Can you explain more to us about how this book came fruition?

A year or two ago, I came across a psychic in a public space. He tried to demonstrate his insight to me, while I tried to think of excuses to leave. Out of concern regarding giving rights to demons, I redirected and dismissed something he said to me. His face fell a little, and then regained composure. Underneath the spiritual warfare and passions that torment people who work as psychics, is a desire to validate their reality and pain.

It’s not prudent of me to assume by his body language what his interpretation was of our interaction, but his movements and the turns that the conversation took reminded me of how I used to be.

I seemed to be dismissing and belittling the reality that he lived with. Then there came a smile on his face, as if I was maybe unevolved, allergic to spiritual exploration, not open minded enough--and there is always a part of me that screams inside

"please, get yourself out, I know what it's like to be in a similar position, and I want you to come save your soul before it's too late". 

I realized that the psychic wanted to share his ideas and world with me, but I had nothing to give him in return in passing.

My book, Outside of the World? Shifting through a large book, that ends in me having converted, being willing to accept suffering, but still trying to figure out how to navigate what was left of my spiritual deception? It wouldn't have been any consolation. After I wrote about my conversion is when it truly hit me that I was in a state of demonic delusion. Going through that process was a series of incremental stages for me, and still is, to tell you the truth. My understanding of events and the world is a problem, if it's stagnant. 

I decided to write a pamphlet to hand out, if I was ever again approached by a psychic, and I would bring myself to say "Oh, do you want this? I know the girl that wrote this".  The pamphlet started out as cursory and to the point, but the desire grew in me to develop it into something that point to the understanding of saints, as well as helpful resources. 

Why do you want to help others?

I wouldn't be even able to honestly tell you, and it’s not clear to me or something I need to know, as far as how much of a help I would actually be to anyone. All I know is that ever since I started working as a psychic when I was 19 years old, I understood that this was something deep, complicated, and something I very seriously needed to find out the truth about. Along with those feelings came a deep attachment and serious concern for those struggling around the world in the same ways that I was. People in pain over knowing information that they shouldn't have been able to know. 

The first time I ever innately was aware of or understood that I had access to information that would soon be realized, was my first day sophomore year of highschool. It wasn't that I thought I was psychic, or receiving information from demons, but rather a simple observation akin to "it's going to rain today". 

I looked across the courtyard, and had a thought that I was going to date the person I saw across the courtyard in exactly one month. It came to pass. That was the first time I secretly felt "simply waiting for someone to realize they love me" in a matter of fact, almost calendar app esque countdown sort of way instead of feeling normal fifteen year old hormonal attraction and uncertainty. It put me in a different lane, a different space, and it was so lonely coming up to someone for the first time, already knowing what dating them felt like, and having them say "who are you?". 

In retrospect, the likelihood that demons gave me that logismoi, and then produced a growing attraction to me in the other individual was high. 

Demonic footholds took me away from having normal human experiences and put me further and further into crevices of isolation. I have always wanted to care for people that had been isolated along with me. 

When did you realize that you were in delusion? 

Upon reading My Elder Joseph the Hesychast, by Elder Ephraim of Arizona, I read about "possessed Haralambos" and started crying, and the world felt different to me, and all I could say for a while was "I'm sorry "

St John Cassian's writings in Philokalia Volume I made me cry as well, and I realized that that information is what I had been looking for for a long time, even before I was Orthodox. It was very hard not to try to go back and think about what my life could have been if I had read that section before I got baptized. 

But what softened my heart up and loosened my mind up enough to have been affected by these books and examples was being only around monasteries for the last five years. Seeing the constant martyrdom of people around me and the grace that has been put forth, Grace that isn't because of me, and then constantly benefiting from that Grace. 

Why is it so hard for people to stop believing that they have special powers and recognize that they are being duped by demons?

It's about disentangling. Demons will also often try to get the subject to form an emotional attachment with them that is very difficult to break away from. It's also a matter of having one's illusory pride shattered. People are often rarely presented with a plethora of examples of or the mechanics behind similar circumstances.

What is the point of “infiltration” and does it ever really work?

I mean, awful things come about as a result of infiltration, but nobody ever gets away with anything after death. I'm obviously not in support of active free masons being in the church receiving, subversion, etc, but my book focuses more on the average inquirer entering the church with syncretist beliefs, especially those that involve magic. It focuses on inquirers that see the Church as something that they can play with. 

Have you ever seen someone instantly lose their help from the demons and suffer greatly like simon magus when the demons left him while he was suspended in the air only to experience a crushing death after falling to the ground?

I've seen people warn each other that trying to do magic on Christians that were actually truly Christian could result in serious repercussions, meaning that some magicians I knew had in fact lost their control, their powers, at least for a time.  I can't say I've ever witnessed a moment that cinematic in someone else's life. I hear about those hardline transitional events in other peoples' testimonies, I guess. I just saw a lot of people still in delusion, and acting in a state of delusion, which is more crushing than a very serious allowance of reality, in my opinion.

 Essentially, you’re asking, “have you ever seen an occultist get a reality check?”

My answer is that realistically they do not get them very often, because they’ve created their own little worlds. It’s pretty much a miracle when it does happen, there’s a level of indisputable acceptance, and then an opportunity for change.

Saint Ephraim claimed that the antichrist would work "miracles" with deception and illusion but not in reality, can you elaborate on what this might mean?

Kind of reminds me of when magicians have demons send people they don't like constant nightmares. It may be visceral and disturbing, but at the end of the day, it's a nightmare. That being said, these "nightmares" can leave physical injuries and scars.

 You can interpret what I just said both metaphorically and literally.

If you would have read your book while you were still practicing magic, what would you have said?

I probably would have tried to read the books that were sourced in it. It wouldn't have mattered to me if I necessarily agreed with it in the moment or not. I was obsessed with spirit discernment, and had a large collection of books on it from different cultures. Unfortunately, I didn't have the books that were most true or important.

I am unable to say whether this book would have properly affected me. Sometimes our hearts are allowed to soften so that we can have ears to hear.

How do you understand pain now that you are Orthodox in comparison to when you felt pain during psychic work? In your book you wrote that psychic work involved "pain for nothing," do you now feel that the Orthodox life involves pain for something?

Yeah. I feel absolutely crushed, like, steam rolled by a tractor and simultaneously in heaven, on and off on a day to day basis. With psychic work I was just feeling terrible sensations, getting myself into terrible situations, getting hopped up on my own pride, and then coping with the disturbance through immersion in art and culture. 

Do you believe the Orthodox Church is a place of healing for all who have participated in the worst kind of satanic rituals? Is there hope for everyone?

Yeah. We have so many examples from the saints of evil being transformed into grace. We just can't ever buy into it, when the demons tell us we're unsalvageable. 

How has Christ helped you reshape your identity?

I feel as though I've been broken in so many different ways to so many different degrees, and experienced so much pain that I'm becoming more and more able to gain freedom in Christ. Like a hammer is being taken to me for the purpose of light to come through the shattered stained glass window. 

This past Holy Week I was watching my spiritual father throw rose petals and myhrr on the Epitaphios of Christ, and suddenly I got a flash of a memory a decade ago of an occultist promising me things that I had desperately wanted at the time. The conscious Christian can't consent to logismoi that forms images, but I'm spiritually immature, and this occurred.

However, in that moment I started crying as I realized that God had given me everything I had ever wanted, beyond what I could have possibly dreamt or expected. The contrast between the memory and what I was seeing in front of me was drastically jarring. That in that moment I was experiencing true beauty and spiritual care that hadn't ever been able to be paralleled through my experiences in the occult world. 

Recap for us what happened with your baptism, so people who are reading about your story for the first time can have some context.

I really bought the lie that the Orthodox Church couldn't help people who were "naturally psychic" and that I would always need to do magic to manage my abilities. I thought I could enter into the Church as ceremonial magicians and adr practitioners participate in the life of the catholic church, while also constantly doing magic. 

What is a Diasporic Religious Practicioner?

In my opinion, you can't really talk about psychism in general without mentioning the African diasporic religions like santería, voudon, etc. Priests and priestesses of these religions sign up for lifelong permission for certain demons to take their body whenever they want, and for constant contact and communion with them. They are a demographic that is used to constant and more overt spirit contact. It's difficult to unravel that and heal from that and seek after nepsis. Besides that set of traditions, most diasporas around the world, from every demographic, have their own folk healers that rely on their senses in order to do magic or employ mediumistic ability. 

Did you ever go through an adr initiation process?

No. I very heavily considered it for some time. I could never stomach consenting to sharing my body permanently with a demon. I wanted freedom.

I am now very pleased to say I know of at least one or two individuals that did that, got head spirits, but converted, and went through a lot of exorcism prayers and such, but that are okay, and you can see the fruits of their struggles in the spiritual health of their children. If the sins of the father are reflected in their bloodline, how much more can the struggles of the father bear fruit? 

Do you mention your experiences in this book?

Not really. You get the sense reading it that a lot of it is from experience and observations. While that is true, I purposefully didn't source a lot of concrete occult-centric information in order to not entice someone at a certain crossroads to want to look certain things up. If you know what publications or historical events I'm referencing, you know. If you don't, don't worry about it. This is really only supposed to apply for people that need an Orthodox perspective on their experiences. What really carries the book are the examples and writings from saints.  People that have a background in psychic work tend to have very heavy or complicated questions that the saints definitely have answers concerning, but that tend to be difficult for most Orthodox Christians to answer on the spot. 

Why add the section on infiltration?

You can't get away with doing magic in the Orthodox Church. I have a few examples from a couple writings that demonstrate this, discuss the protestant satanic panic, and give an example of a type of infiltration by which the infiltrator is being subject to abuse.

I'm very aware that I could have met a very bad end, and that I live with certain consequences for my actions. It's just a lie that you can get away with such things in the Orthodox Church. Syncretism is a disease. I'm grateful I have more time to repent. 

I need it. 

The ebook is now available through Artos and Etsy

The paperback is available on Amazon