With its colorful exterior, Apple Valley Books is certainly the most cheerful looking store in the small town of Winthrop, Maine. Painted yellow and blue, the storefront resembles a toy store more than a bookstore, and the colorful colors cry out "Come in! Have fun and enjoy our wares!"
The customer opens the door to see a brightly-lit, well-kept store. There on the right, however, is an unusual sight. Atop a tall bookshelf sits a large horned devil. The visitor quickly passes by, past rows of bookshelves with nondescript books, and nothing remarkable meets the eye until the section marked "Teenage." Curiously, the top three shelves of this "Teenage" section offer one paranormal-themed book after another.
This section is arranged so that an unsuspecting teen is easily lured into occult literature. The first book to catch the eye is called Godless, a book apparently written to shake a young person's faith in God. Nearby is You are So Dead to Me, a novel about a teen girl's use of occult powers to control zombies. Another book is even worse, one of the House of Night series, books which glamorize vampirism. Close by is Hunter's Moon, a particularly objectionable teen novel in which readers are warned not to be judgmental about the hero of the book, a werewolf who is a serial killer.
On the opposite side of the store, New Age materials are mixed in carelessly with Bibles and a few other Christian books. Close to the counter, where the owner sits, is a section dedicated to the occult. There one finds scores of books on how to practice witchcraft and cast spells. In a word, the section is about ritual magic.
In the back of the store is a children's section, with a chair for easy reading, and shelves of brightly-colored books. The book which immediately catches the eye is a biography of Margaret Chase Smith, with a full length portrait of the female senator on the cover. Several copies are stood on end, and placed strategically around the room to attract the attention of young girls.
Downstairs is a room filled with books on various topics, books on sports, books on computer technology and nature, and murder mysteries. On many of the bookshelves is a metal plaquette of the same figure customers saw when they entered, a horned devil.
No photos accompany this story, since the owner warned our reporter not to take pictures. For the same reason, The Record is not even running a photo of the exterior of the store.
So why is Rita Moran, the owner of the store, wary of letting the public photograph the inside of Apple Valley Books?
The answer is provided by Rita Moran herself. Moran is Chairwoman of the Kennebec County Democratic Committee. In the summer of 2007, The Record revealed that Moran is a practitioner of the occult, and participates in occult rituals at a shrine dedicated to the goddess of witchcraft. The shrine is located in Sydney, four miles from the state capital of Augusta, and is furnished with a cauldron, an altar, and an idol of the goddess made from twigs and branches. As reported by The Record, the pagan shrine on Bog Road in Sydney is the only shrine to Hecate in New England. Shown above is a photo of the pagan altar four miles from the state capital.
In August, The Record revealed that Moran claimed to have cast a spell on Mike Hein, the current Administrator of the Christian Civic League of Maine. Moran also claimed that the League outed her as a pagan in response to the defeat of a Pro-Life candidate, Penny Morrell, who ran for a House seat in District 83 in 2007. Morrell was an employee of Maine Right to Life at the time. The issue of abortion was the most important issue in the election, and one factor in Morrell's loss was the use of phone banks paid for by Planned Parenthood.
Visitors to Rita Moran's bookstore will see that the occult is mixed in with the ordinary so as to almost be imperceptible. In the same way, the forces of darkness operate unnoticed in our civic life disguised as "marriage equality" (homosexual marriage) or "freedom of choice," (abortion) and few citizens are brave enough to call these practices what they really are - evil.
Perhaps it is time to look at politics in Maine with a more discerning eye. The very least we can do is to ask that our political leaders - including those who support abortion and homosexual marriage - stop offering books about witchcraft and vampirism to the public, especially our precious young people.
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