Vandals spray ‘satanic symbols,’ deface statues at Union City parish

The following are excerpts from a Feb. 22 story published in The Argus, a newspaper serving Union City. A link to the full story is provided below.

UNION CITY — Vandals desecrated a Catholic church, destroying a cross, defacing statues and spray-painting graffiti with satanic symbols — acts discovered on Ash Wednesday that police have classified as a hate crime.

The vandalism was discovered at St. Anne Catholic Church around 7 a.m., about an hour before services were scheduled for the first day of Lent, a 40-day season of fasting and prayer before the Easter holiday. 

“This is terrible and very disturbing,” said the Rev. Geoffrey Baraan, the church’s pastor for the past six years. “I’m still shaking with fear and wonder and disbelief.”

Peter Petit, a longtime parishioner, discovered the damage when he arrived to unlock the house of worship built at Cabello and Dyer streets in 1982.

He said he was shocked to find the front of the church spray-painted in two places with a circled pentagram — a common satanic symbol — surrounded by the words “Satan” and the Latin phrase “Carpe Noctem,” meaning “Seize the night.”

Vandals destroyed a wooden cross and knocked over a statue resembling a stone tablet.

A second statue of the Holy Family also was damaged, as vandals covered in black paint the faces of the Virgin Mary and Joseph, and spray-painted a small pentagram on each of their chests. The statue’s third figure — Jesus as a child — was not harmed.

To read the full story, Click Here.

 

READER COMMENTS

Posted Monday, February 27, 2012 5:06 AM By Canisius
We are people surprised the forces of darkness are marshalling their forces for a final attack against the Church. This attack will come from vandals like these evil creatures (not I will not pray for them, damn them yes) and the attack will come from secular leftist that are running the government

Posted Monday, February 27, 2012 6:53 AM By JMJ
I pray that those involved will be forced to not only pay for the damages, but, also to help repair the items that they destroyed so as to get an idea of what sort of problems that they caused. They should also have to get up at each and every Mass to apologize for their stupidity. +JMJ+

Posted Monday, February 27, 2012 8:09 AM By Brad
One week ago our church of St. Patrick in Grass Valley was vandalized with a 3′ pentagram (an upside-down one, which is the goat demon, baphomet). Inside the points of the pentagram are Mandarin taoist symbols for the five pagan elements of nature: pure pablum. So this graffiti is a combination of satanism and taoism. Please all who read this, pray for Grass Valley and our pastor, who has to sleep about 20′ away from this monstrosity until we can remove it.

Posted Monday, February 27, 2012 8:24 AM By perrywRinkle
That’s Union City, South Carolina, right?

Posted Monday, February 27, 2012 8:47 AM By Catholic Joe
Get use to it. We’re so oblvivious to the outright hostility towards the Pope when he travels all over Europe. The hostility towards World Youth Day pilgrims last year in Spain. Are we growing deep roots with the Truth should persecution or tribulations come? And they are coming. We can’t continue this complacent and spiritually mellow approach to our faith!

Posted Monday, February 27, 2012 8:51 AM By Anne T.
St. Michael the Archangel, defend us in battle. Be our protection against the wickeness and snares of the Devil; may God rebuke him, we humbly pray; and do thou, O Prince of the heavenly host, by the power of God thrust into hell Satan and all evil spirits who wander through the world for the ruin of souls. Amen.

Posted Monday, February 27, 2012 9:22 AM By goodcause
We must pray for the criminals who did this and hope the police will make arrests soon. Why isn’t the mainstream covering this? If it was a mosque they would be all over it, right?

Posted Monday, February 27, 2012 10:33 AM By Paul
This despicable attack is most likely just a forerunner of worse to come. Sadly, we can expect attacks like this to multiply, and those who focus their rage upon our sacred religious symbols and Churches will soon turn their evil attention toward the faithful Attacks like this have been on the increase for sometime and they are increasing in scope, brazenness and intensity. Michael Voris addressed this issue of anti-Catholicism in some of his excellent online videos. Catholics should not expect any quarter or sympathy from the government. Pray for God’s protection. These evil malefactors are in league with Satan himself.

Posted Monday, February 27, 2012 11:35 AM By JLS
JMJ, what are the crooks going to pay with?

Posted Monday, February 27, 2012 11:49 AM By Elizabeth
This is the time for speaking up and praying as the ‘Church Militant” with charity of course!!!

Posted Monday, February 27, 2012 12:09 PM By Abeca Christian
Time to make people accountable. Forget all this respect crap and stuff, make them accountable!

Posted Monday, February 27, 2012 5:46 PM By Jim
If a crime like this would have happened against a Planned Parenthood clinic, it would be all over the national news!

Posted Monday, February 27, 2012 7:50 PM By JLS
There is a reason that the old monasteries were built like castles.

Posted Monday, February 27, 2012 7:59 PM By MJ
JLS — I admit, I do not always agree with you, and consider myself to have different paradigms than you, so to speak, but your comment about monasteries being built like castles is dead on. Dead on. And I’ll tell you what, those fortified monasteries survived, didn’t they?

Posted Tuesday, February 28, 2012 8:20 AM By JLS
Yes, MJ, those fortified monasteries were the forerunners of the Second Amendment in the Bill of Rights to the US Constitution.

Posted Tuesday, February 28, 2012 8:24 AM By JLS
MJ, on paradigms, what I do is try to look from different perspectives, and make conclusions. Yet it is not I who has created the Catholic Church, and so I have to realize that perspectives are not the same as God given authority … but God gives eyes to see, ears to hear and minds to reason, and it is not only the hierarchy who has these faculties.

Posted Thursday, March 01, 2012 1:53 PM By k
What happened to the shrine at Our Lady of Guadelupe in San Diego?