By Alina Jannol –

As she sat on the playground at the Waldorf Steiner School in England, 11-year-old Naela Rose became demon possessed.

“I remember sitting in the playground and I felt the spirit enter me, and I was instantly suicidal,” says Naela on a Doreen Virtue video. “I knew this was an outside entity. From that moment on, I suffered from obsessive thoughts of self-harm and depression. It just hit me.

“Satan just loves to go after children. Children are so young and open and sensitive. If you’re unprotected, it’s very dangerous.”

Naela’s parents were liberal, open-minded, Reiki-instructed and thought the occult-based school, a real-life version of Harry Potter’s Hogwarts, would be perfect.

Beginning at Waldorf, she learned pagan rituals, worship of the creation, tantra yoga and empowering the feminine through worship of ancient goddesses.

“I was a proud pagan. I loved Mother Earth. I called myself a witch. I was into all these things,” Naela says. “I was completely seduced by the idea of divine feminine rising, and that I am in fact a goddess.”

At first she touted herself as a high priestess only. But as the adulation of followers progressed, she decided to become a full-on goddess. She felt it very flattering to hear followers in her training affirm her god-status.

Naela had become a New Age master raking in beaucoup bucks with constant seminars and training. “At the peak of my success in New Age, I felt the most hollow and empty,” she recognizes.

Meanwhile, she internally battled suicide, depression, anxiety and nightmares. She came from a broken family. The idea was to be a “wounded healer,” a teacher showing the way she herself was following towards inner healing. When the occult didn’t provide relief, she took alcohol, drugs and chain-smoking.

She promoted herself on Instagram as a New Age guru. But inside, nothing could heal the hurt, even though she herself took course after course and combed through New Age readings and teachings.

In the fullness of time, Jesus came to her in a dream.

But since she had never read the Bible, she didn’t know what to do. She added Jesus to her personal pantheon. Since she had a strong inclination towards worshiping feminine goddesses, she added Mary Magdalene and Sophia, the supposed female counterpart of Jesus.

“I had completely given my allegiance over to the goddess, to the point where I had really given her my life and my soul, and she was completely indwelling me and controlling me,” Naela says. “You have to be an egomaniac to think you are a god.”

She was living in South France at the time and was mounting an initiation school for Sophia seekers, but got interrupted.

“I felt the Holy Spirit drawing me to my knees in godly repentance,” she says. “One day I went from being this egomaniac who thought I was healing the world to the next day being on my bedroom floor weeping, begging God – even though I didn’t know who that was – to forgive my sins.”

All her delusions crumbled.

“I’m a liar,” she cried in repentance. “I’m a thief. I’ve stolen all of this New Age stuff and put it together to make money for myself.”

The conviction weighed heavily on her.

“The fear of God came upon me,” she admits. “I literally felt like I could not go on unless I got forgiveness. I felt like I would die unless I was forgiven for everything I’d done. The next day, I felt the Spirit of Jesus enter my room and I just broke down and cried.”

Prompted by the Spirit, she confessed out loud with her mouth something she didn’t yet fully understand: “Jesus is the only way to God.”

She had never read the Bible, so where did that come from? she wondered.

Ironically, two clients that attended her last seminar also became born-again at the same time, and the three connected to ask each other what was happening and to look for a church together.

“We’re broken. We cannot fix ourselves…We need a Savior,” they decided.

As Naela came to God and grew in His church, she realized she had to make financial restitution to her past clients as best she could. This was something she couldn’t do completely because she had been a spendthrift and had no savings. Also, how would she earn money?

“My whole life was made by selling this deception,” she says. “Healing is free. You don’t need to pay to get free.”

For publishing on Instagram healing in Jesus free of charge, she got her biggest blowback from her friends and former clients. Half of New Age is making money with esoteric teachings, she says.

As she grew in Jesus, she saw how the feminine deity was a delusion. Instead of being liberated from patriarchy by worshiping the goddess, she had become lost. Now, she has a different take on adoring God the Father and Jesus the Son.

“There’s nothing more empowering for me as a woman than to completely submit to Jesus Christ,” Naela says.

“I felt complete peace for the first time in my life and I felt loved for the first time in my life,” Naela says. “If you are truly an open-minded, spiritual person, take a look at the Bible, pray to Jesus, ask for the truth. You shouldn’t be threatened by the idea that Christianity could be true.”

Alina Jannol studies at the Lighthouse Christian Academy in Santa Monica.