Stay tuned to the end for news from Mike Cosper and Rebekah Sebastian on upcoming Bonus episodes!
In the finale of Devil and the Deep Blue Sea, we try to do the impossible: tie the threads together. From criminal cases to political crusades, we retrace the lines between fear, faith, and power that shaped the Satanic Panic—and continue influencing our world today.
Mike Cosper and Rebekah Sebastian open with a game that highlights just how absurd things got, then dive into the deeper questions: Why did the Satanic Panic take hold? And how does it compare to modern conspiracies like Pizzagate, QAnon, and the January 6 insurrection?
Spoiler: The panic didn’t entirely vanish—it morphed into a tool for grievance, repurposed by conspiracy theorists to target their perceived enemies.
Bonus episodes are still to come, so stay subscribed. And if this series made you think, feel, or question, share it with a friend.
Resources:
The Roys Report: “James Robison Under Fire for Discrepancies Regarding Involvement with Robert Morris in 1980s” by Julie Roys
Mike Rothschild, author, Jewish Space Lasers
Matthew D. Taylor, senior Christian scholar at the Institute for Islamic, Christian, and Jewish Studies
Mike Warnke Tribunal Board hearing
West Memphis Three case
Devil and the Deep Blue Sea is a production of Christianity Today
Hosted and written by Mike Cosper
Produced by Rebekah Sebastian, with production assistance by Dawn Adams
Sound Design and Mix Engineer: TJ Hester
Sound Design, Animation, and Video: Steve Scheidler
Graphic Design: Nim Ben Reuven
Music by Dirt Poor Robins
Erik Petrik and Mike Cosper are the executive producers of CT Media Podcasts, and Matt Stevens is our senior producer.
If you enjoyed this episode, please leave us a rating and review to help more people find the show. Thanks for listening.
Can’t wait for the next episode? Join host Mike Cosper for a livestream every other Monday on the CT YouTube channel or the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea Facebook page.
Join our Facebook group for deeper conversations and behind-the-scenes content.
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
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1:54:09
The Spell Breaks
As we approach the end of the series, we learn that the Satanic Panic didn’t end with a bang. It was more of a slow fade-out. The Religious Right had secured major political and cultural victories. Evangelicals no longer needed Satan to galvanize their movement—their influence was cemented. Fear of the Devil simply became less useful.
Today’s episode marks a turning point in the series. Join us as we revisit the concept of memory—this time with two experts who spent their careers trying to properly understand it. Retired FBI agent Kenneth Lanning, one of the earliest skeptics inside law enforcement during the Satanic Panic, reveals how disturbing allegations collapsed under the weight of their own implausibility.
Elizabeth Loftus, renowned cognitive psychologist and professor, has shown how easily false memories can be implanted, reshaped, and believed with unwavering conviction. Together, these two experts help us begin to answer a central question of this season: How did the Satanic Panic end? And what are the consequences of believing, prosecuting, and punishing based on memory alone?
Resources:
Kenneth Lanning, retired FBI agent
Elizabeth Loftus, PhD, psychologist and educator
Devil and the Deep Blue Sea is a production of Christianity Today
Hosted and written by Mike Cosper
Produced by Rebekah Sebastian, with production assistance by Dawn Adams
Sound Design and Mix Engineer: TJ Hester
Sound Design, Animation, and Video: Steve Scheidler
Graphic Design: Nim Ben Reuven
Music by Dirt Poor Robins
Erik Petrik and Mike Cosper are the executive producers of CT Media Podcasts, and Matt Stevens is our senior producer.
If you enjoyed this episode, please leave us a rating and review to help more people find the show. Thanks for listening.
Can’t wait for the next episode? Join host Mike Cosper for a livestream every other Monday on the CT YouTube channel or the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea Facebook page.
Join our Facebook group for deeper conversations and behind-the-scenes content.
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
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58:26
Joke's On Us
Remember Mike Warnke, the world’s #1 Christian comedian from Episode 3? We’ll revisit his story with a little fact-checking, but first, we introduce you to another infamous figure of the Satanic Panic: Lauren Stratford. Her memoir, Satan’s Underground, recounted her harrowing experience with satanic ritual abuse in vivid, gruesome detail—capturing the imagination of millions. However, years after her book became a bestseller, her story was thoroughly debunked as a complete fabrication. But Lauren wasn't done. She resurfaced with a new name and a whole new grift.
As we unpack her rise and fall, we’ll also explore the broader cultural forces at play during the Satanic Panic. From the rise of daycare culture sparking anxieties around working mothers to the growing awareness of child sexual abuse, we examine how these societal fears were manipulated by the media to create and spread exaggerated, harmful narratives.
Resources:
Dr. Laura Robinson, New Testament Scholar, Butler University
Satan’s Sideshow: The True Lauren Stratford Story by By Bob & Gretchen Passantino and Jon Trott
Devil and the Deep Blue Sea is a production of Christianity Today
Hosted and written by Mike Cosper
Produced by Rebekah Sebastian, with production assistance by Dawn Adams
Sound Design and Mix Engineer: TJ Hester
Sound Design, Animation, and Video: Steve Scheidler
Graphic Design: Nim Ben Reuven
Music by Dirt Poor Robins
Erik Petrik and Mike Cosper are the executive producers of CT Media Podcasts, and Matt Stevens is our senior producer.
If you enjoyed this episode, please leave us a rating and review to help more people find the show. Thanks for listening.
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
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43:26
BONUS: Deep Dive with Mike Cosper: Q&A + Best of DDBS Live Streams
The Devil and the Deep Blue Sea team is on spring break, so we’re taking this opportunity to bring you something a little different. In this interview with show creator and host Mike Cosper, we explore how the ripple effects of the Satanic Panic still echo today. You’ll also learn the story behind the series title—and Mike answers a burning question: Has the church ever truly reckoned with its role in the panic?
Then, stick around for a special bonus: some of our favorite moments from the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea livestreams, where we go off-script and deeper into the story with special guests and listeners like you.
Join the DDBS Facebook group to be part of the group and catch our next livestream.
We will be back in one week with an all-new episode.
Devil and the Deep Blue Sea is a production of Christianity Today
Hosted and written by Mike Cosper
Produced by Rebekah Sebastian, with production assistance by Dawn Adams
Sound Design and Mix Engineer: TJ Hester
Sound Design, Animation, and Video: Steve Scheidler
Graphic Design: Nim Ben Reuven
Music by Dirt Poor Robins
Erik Petrik and Mike Cosper are the executive producers of CT Media Podcasts, and Matt Stevens is our senior producer.
If you enjoyed this episode, please leave us a rating and review to help more people find the show. Thanks for listening.
Can’t wait for the next episode? Join host Mike Cosper for a livestream every other Monday on the CT YouTube channel or the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea Facebook page.
Join our Facebook group for deeper conversations and behind-the-scenes content.
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
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1:18:38
Hell's Bells
Do you hear what I hear? Backmasking.
From the Beatles to Led Zeppelin, rumors of hidden, subversive messages in popular music sent Christians into a frenzy. Backmasking wasn’t just a recording trick—it was seen as proof that rock musicians weren’t just after album sales but after the very souls of our children. Today, we’re unpacking the hysteria around backmasking, but first let’s explore the conservative resurgence and the world events that set the stage for a full-blown moral panic.
We’ll begin at the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics, where megachurches mobilized thousands of evangelists to the spiritual frontlines of the world games, then we’ll head south to the buried secrets within the Southern Baptist Convention. At the center of this resurgence were two men with unchecked power—Paul Pressler and Paige Patterson. Their legacy was once seen as the North Star of conservative values but would later be tainted by allegations of abuse and cover-ups that exposed the very evil they claimed to stand against.
Join our Facebook group for deeper conversations and behind-the-scenes content.
Can’t wait for the next episode? Join host Mike Cosper for a livestream every other Monday on the CT YouTube channel or the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea Facebook page.
Resources:
Matthew D. Taylor, scholar and author, The Violent Take it By Force
Robert Downen, reporter, The Texas Tribune
Sarah Pulliam Bailey, religion reporter
Devil and the Deep Blue Sea is a production of Christianity Today
Hosted and written by Mike Cosper
Produced by Rebekah Sebastian, with production assistance by Dawn Adams
Sound Design and Mix Engineer: TJ Hester
Sound Design, Animation, and Video: Steve Scheidler
Graphic Design: Nim Ben Reuven
Music by Dirt Poor Robins
Erik Petrik and Mike Cosper are the executive producers of CT Media Podcasts, and Matt Stevens is our senior producer.
If you enjoyed this episode, please leave us a rating and review to help more people find the show. Thanks for listening.
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
They say the Devil’s in the details, but when conspiracies captivate our imaginations, we often overlook the real devils walking among us.
From the creators of the hit podcast The Rise and Fall of Mars Hill comes a new show, Devil and the Deep Blue Sea, which takes you back to the Satanic Panic that gripped America in the 1980s and 90s.
This limited series explores how hysteria gripped parents and teens through cautionary tales like Go Ask Alice, influenced notorious criminal cases like the West Memphis Three, and catapulted the political agenda of the Moral Majority.
Join as we seek to understand how this wave of panic devastated innocent lives and diverted the church’s attention from the evil lurking in its own pews.
Ireland