Doreen Virtue - New Age Moneymaker to Born Again Biblethumper

[Alisamer]

I definitely thought that if nothing else, people here would be interested in this. A whole new rabbit hole!

Doreen Virtue, PhD (as is printed in large letters on her products - she does apparently have a genuine PhD in psychology), was one of the most prolific sellers of "New Age" products for years. There are SIX pages worth of her books just on Thriftbooks.com. Books, oracle decks, tarot decks, online classes, "Angelology" certifications, CDs, etc. If someone interested in angels, fairies, tarot, spirituality, or anything "new age" or occult might be willing to pay money, Doreen had it available for purchase. (And to me, all her stuff looks amazingly similar. All the same, can ID it at a glance, and all pretty boring looking, like it was cranked out as quickly as possible.)

She was raised as a Christian Scientist. As an adult she started out using her PhD in psychology as a therapist, director of a psychiatric inpatient unit, and writing self-help books on actual psychology topics. All good so far. THEN... apparently she was a victim of an attempted carjacking. Frightening and traumatic, no doubt. But, this is apparently what lead her to the "new age" focus most of her adult life was spent in. 

As an armed robber was threatening her, an angel appeared and told her to scream.

I know, right? Most of us would likely scream without needing an angel to appear and tell us to. But, apparently an angel appeared, told her to scream, and she was saved from the robber.

She then began studying angels, angel numbers, and guardian angels, and created "angel therapy" which is apparently regular therapy but with extra help from your guardian angels. She claimed to have been clairvoyant since childhood. She also began cranking out the product - book after oracle deck after "angel number calculator" after moneymaker. Most of her focus was on angels and "ascended masters" (I think these are like Mary, Jesus, Buddha, etc. - past religious leaders and mythological people), but she dipped into fairies, animal spirits, goddesses, many other religions, and other mythology as well. She had online courses, classes, facebook groups, etc. You could pay to become a certified angelologist, fairyologist, angel intuitive, or angel therapist.

She ended up quite well off, as you might imagine. She was raking in millions. At some point in all this she also had an animal rescue ranch in Hawaii, which she happily took donations toward (non tax deductible, as it was not a registered charity). 

THEN... 2017. She has a vision of Jesus himself. She is immediately born again, gets baptized, becomes a fundamentalist-leaning member of the episcopal church, and begins to denounce her previous work. Slowly, at first... "don't use the tarot cards" followed by "don't use the fairy stuff" and on and on until she had basically denounced all her previous work.

This of course came along with a new book called "decieved no more" talking about her conversion. Available on Amazon!

During all this, she STILL had courses in progress. People had purchased online resources, that she was now taking down and removing the access they had paid for. Customers were confused, angry, and out a bunch of money in some cases. She claims to have offered refunds to people until she could no longer afford to (she's got a brief mention of owing back taxes on her website as well... I haven't figured out details on that), but apparently customer service was horrible, people were treated badly, and the end result was that lots of people got shafted. 

She moved back to the mainland, and the animals at the ranch apparently were "safely rehomed" according to her. No proof of this seems to exist, however. 

And NOW, she's denounced her own vision of Jesus - some male church leaders convinced her that it was not a genuine vision. With a new book on the way, apparently!

It's fascinating - she went from unquestioning belief in angels, fairies, etc. to suddenly believing just as fervently that all those things are actually demons! She's 100% black and white thinking, just like many of our fundies here. It's a complete flip flop. Her website can be pretty amusing to read. She's now against yoga, Harry Potter, peace signs, meditation, unicorns, statues, hypnosis, fairies, "following your heart", typing "OMG", drum circles, empowerment, and aliens. Yep, aliens. Because they might actually be demons. That's her reason for most things. Fairies? Demons. Angels? Demons in disguise. That vision she had of Jesus himself? Yep. Demon!

To the point that she won't go in her husband's office because he's got a couple paintings of angels hanging on the wall in there. He refused to toss them with the rest of the stuff in the house. That must have been one heck of a bonfire. She also won't go near her mother's bookshelf because a couple of her own old books are on there that her mom wants to keep.

For fun, here's the bare list of her "A to Z of New Age practices to avoid". On her site there are descriptions for all these. Some are ridiculous, some are factually incorrect, some are just sad. Some seem to make sense as part of a list... until you read her explanation why.

Spoiler

Affirmations without God 

Aliens 

Angel Cards 

Angel Numbers

Angel Readings 

Ascended Masters 

Astral Projection 

Astrocartography 

Astrology 

Chakras 

Channeled Books 

Channeling 

Christ Consciousness

Course in Miracles 

Crystals

Cults 

Deities and Divinities 

Divination 

Dream Catchers 

Drumming Circles 

Earth Angels

Empowerment 

Energy Healing 

Entity Group 

Fairies 

Feng Shui 

Flower of Life 

Follow Your Heart (or Believe; Follow Your Dreams; Follow Your Bliss; etc.) 

Goddesses

Harry Potter 

Horoscopes

Hypnosis 

Idols 

Journeying 

Law of Attraction 

Mandalas

Manifesting 

Meditating without God 

Mediumship 

Mercury Retrograde 

Metatron’s Cube 

Mindfulness 

Numerology 

OMG

Oracle Cards 

Out-of-Body Experiencing

Paganism 

Pantheism 

Past-Life Regression

Peace Signs 

Pendulums 

Polytheism 

Power Animals 

Prosperity Gospel 

Psychic Readings 

Reiki 

Sage 

Sacred Geometry 

Shamanism 

Sorcery

Spirit Guides 

Statues 

Sweat Lodges

Tapping (EFT)

Tarot Cards 

Unicorns 

Universalism 

Universe 

Vision Board 

Wicca 

Witchcraft

Yoga 

Zodiac Signs 

She clearly believes nearly all these things are real, dangerous, and WILL lead you straight into having demons come hang out with you at all times to lead you away from God. Apparently the version of God she believes in is helpless against images printed on cardboard, fiction books, symmetrical doodles and geometric lines, stretches done in certain positions, and sparkly unicorn stickers. 

And she wants everyone who has any of her old products to please burn them.

Then buy her new books!

[JermajestyDuggar]

The one good thing about this woman is her constant changing of beliefs. Most people are turned off by that. She may have had a lot of humpers back when she was all about the fairies and angels. But she’s fucked them over. And now she may not get too many fundie humpers because of her history. If she changed her mind that many times, she may do it again. And I doubt too many fundies would trust her enough to hump her leg and buy all her stuff. 

Edited May 11, 2022 by JermajestyDuggar

[Giraffe]

Thanks for posting this! I found her sometime ago on a YouTube rabbit hole I went down. I can't figure her out. She seems like someone who really should've completely backed out of public view for a few years while she figured out her new views. Instead I find her confusing more than anything. Supposedly her new god is able to take away her sins and save her etc., but that same god is overwhelmed by...Harry Potter?? 🤦‍♀️

[hoipolloi]

What a piece of work. Once a grifter always a grifter.

Hereʻs some background on her ill-fated "animal rescue ranch" in Hawaii. The comments are quite something.

 

 

[Hane]

My youngest sister, an otherwise pretty rational Catholic, was a big fan of hers for years, doing “angel card” readings for family and friends for years. Then she suddenly stopped because Doreen Virtue said this stuff was wrong. It struck me as a bizarre u-turn.

[Alisamer]

14 minutes ago, Hane said:

My youngest sister, an otherwise pretty rational Catholic, was a big fan of hers for years, doing “angel card” readings for family and friends for years. Then she suddenly stopped because Doreen Virtue said this stuff was wrong. It struck me as a bizarre u-turn.

Isn't it? I wonder what the real truth is about Doreen Virtue converting. She'd been incorporating Christianity into her stuff all along, mixed in with everything else. I wonder exactly what was the experience that made her go essentially fundie? Because if it was a vision of Jesus, she now denounces that vision. So... the vision was a demon in disguise trying to lead her astray by leading her to become born again? How's that work?

For full disclosure, I read tarot. For myself, mostly. And I collect the cards, because they are beautiful. But I don't have any of hers because they are boring, IMO. (Also I am not so much into the woo part of tarot. I think it's like rorshach tests - they help us see what we already know, more or less.)

She claims she's trying to get her new age stuff all pulled from the market but most of it is still available apparently. Some with her name removed. Her co-author for a long time was Radleigh Valentine so their name is still on much of the stuff still in production.

[Bluebirdbluebell]

I think Radleigh Valentine is the artist who did the illustrations for some of her decks. I think Doreen wrote the deck books, but I don't think she was the artist. She hired artists like Lisa Eddy.

(For clarification, most oracle decks come with a book that explains the cards.)

 

[danvillebelle]

My 21yo daughter (who still lives with us) is a green witch.  She regularly performs protective/positive spells, has a small "apothecary" of herbs in her closet, a few tarot decks, crystals, and LOTS of plants.  

No demon sightings as of yet.  Will report back if I spot one. ☮️

[MamaJunebug]

I just imagined an afterlife where folks who made money off the backs of deities find  themselves facing all the embodiments of God … 
 

I’ll let y’all’s imaginations take over from there. But at least some deities hsve taken off a house-shoe….  

[Soulhuntress]

I remember her.  She was like Silver Ravenwolf but for Pagan lite folks. 

[Granwych]

On 5/12/2022 at 6:54 AM, danvillebelle said:

My 21yo daughter (who still lives with us) is a green witch.  She regularly performs protective/positive spells, has a small "apothecary" of herbs in her closet, a few tarot decks, crystals, and LOTS of plants.  

No demon sightings as of yet.  Will report back if I spot one. ☮️

No demon is going to be dumb enough to mess with your green witch daughter.   It’s more fun for the denizens of hell to torment and terrify fundies.

your daughter sounds awesome—

[danvillebelle]

17 hours ago, Granwych said:

No demon is going to be dumb enough to mess with your green witch daughter.   It’s more fun for the denizens of hell to torment and terrify fundies.

your daughter sounds awesome—

Thanks.  She is.  She has gone through a lot of healing; she was raised Orthodox by us, then went to a Baptist church with her best friend at the time in her teens, and has since realized a lot of it was traumatic for her.  She ditched Christianity for good 3 years ago and has never been more confident.  We support her 100% in wherever her spirituality takes her. 

[Alisamer]

On 5/14/2022 at 5:17 PM, danvillebelle said:

Thanks.  She is.  She has gone through a lot of healing; she was raised Orthodox by us, then went to a Baptist church with her best friend at the time in her teens, and has since realized a lot of it was traumatic for her.  She ditched Christianity for good 3 years ago and has never been more confident.  We support her 100% in wherever her spirituality takes her. 

That's awesome of you to support her. I have found myself, as I learn and think more, realizing that I've been leaning witchier and witchier over time since I was a little kid. So I'm learning more of that sort of thing now. That path calls to me more and more. I'm largely doing the same things I've done for a long time, just more deliberately and with more intention, and it feels more meaningful to me than church every really has.

I'm hoping to go to a summer solstice festival next weekend! That should be super fun.