People have been known to turn to magic in times of uncertainty, so perhaps it is not so surprising that tarot readings and astrology are gaining popularity in today’s Russia.

In 2024, Russians bought nearly RUB 2 billion ($20 million) worth of tarot cards on major online marketplaces – almost double the amount the year before, according to Forbes.

YouTuber Anton Suvorkin and his mother, Anzhelika Akulenko, have become stars for their political tarot readings. Their channel features videos on nearly every political issue.

One of them, posted in May 2022, examined the outcomes of the war in Ukraine. For Russia’s future, the cards drawn were The Devil, Death and Ten of Swords.

“It’s like ten people dying for one,” Akulenko interpreted the cards. In response to the question of what Russia needed for peace, the card drawn was The Emperor. “It is the decision of one person,” she predicted.

In an interview with the exiled Russian news station TV Rain, Akulenko said that many people turn to her with questions about the war.

“Every other person asks me how to protect their son, how to protect their husband,” she said. Among the most common questions were: “when will the war end?”; “who will get Crimea?”’; and “will my son manage to leave the country?”

Shamans are also on the rise. According to Siberia.Realities, a regional news outlet of RFE/RL's Russian service, shamans across different regions have performed rituals for mobilized soldiers and provided protective charms for the front line.

One anonymous source told Siberia.Realities that he went to a shaman to find his son who had gone missing in action. He waited three weeks for an appointment, but the shaman gave no concrete answers. Later, his son’s body was identified through DNA testing.

“I know people who still visit shamans even after the funerals,” the source said. “Some refuse to believe it was their son who was buried. The coffins are usually closed. So they keep searching or ask the shamans to contact the deceased’s soul.”

Clinical psychologist Darya Yausheva, in an interview with the YouTube channel of Novaya Gazeta (called NO.Media from Russia), explained that the surge in mysticism comes from people trying to find stability in a world where none seems to exist.

“It feels like the usual logic of events is breaking down. That’s why people start looking for answers and explanations,” Yausheva said. “Anxiety rises, fears and phobias start to appear. People turn to esotericism to cope, for something to hold onto.”

The state pollster VTsIOM reports that every second woman and every third man in the country follows astrological forecasts. One in seven Russians has had a tarot reading at least once.

Even businesses are part of the trend. In March, Russia’s largest food retailer, X5 Group, posted a job listing for a tarot reader to help with hiring. As the news site Gazeta.ru reported, the requirements included at least two years of experience in tarot reading, proficiency with multiple decks and “an established energy shield against external magical influence.” The listing also mentioned that knowledge of related fields, such as astrology, numerology and esotericism, would be a plus.

Russia’s growing interest in the occult has alarmed both the government and the Orthodox Church. Patriarch Kirill has repeatedly warned of attempts to revive paganism and condemned esoteric practices. In September 2023, he even linked them to the war.

“War gives rise to distorted forms of spirituality. For example, neo-pagan ideas often take root among soldiers because [these ideas] emphasize… violence and strength. And the army is a place where human strength is applied, so there is a high risk that unchurched soldiers, far from Orthodoxy, will be interested by the rhetoric of neo-pagan preachers,” he was quoted as saying by the state news outlet RIA Novosti.

He also urged priests to “remind soldiers of the feats of Christian saints who served their homeland.”

Ahead of Orthodox Christmas on January 7, Patriarch Kirill appeared on the pro-Kremlin TV channel Russia-1 to warn against fortune-telling.

“People need to understand that behind [magic] lies an appeal to dark forces. People call the devil so the devil will help them. The devil will help so much that you will wish you never went to him. I strongly discourage it,” he said.

At the end of January, the patriarch attacked “satanism,” calling for it to be officially recognized as an extremist movement, and called occultism an “ideological diversion.”

Russia’s parliament is also taking action. In January, Duma Deputy Andrei Svintsov introduced a bill to ban “any advertising or promotion of tarot services.”

“I am not proposing to ban tarot card sales or tarot readings themselves – if they are done for entertainment purposes,” the state news outlet TASS quoted Svintsov.

Journalist and religious scholar Xenia Loutchenko says the patriarch’s fight against paganism and the occult is attributable to a “fear of competition.”

“The Russian Orthodox Church has sensed that this is where the threat to their monopoly on the sacred, on miracles and mysticism comes from,” she said in an interview with Carnegie Politika.

Though the government is now growing concerned, magicians and psychics have been a part of Russian state television for decades.

Since 2007, the show Bitva Extrasensov (“Battle of the Psychics” – Russia’s version of Britian’s Psychic Challenge) has remained very popular, running for 24 seasons. It features people who claim to have supernatural abilities competing in different challenges, including solving real crimes with magic. Even though multiple investigations have exposed the show as fake, people facing real tragedies still look to it for answers.

In November, the ongoing discussions about banning occult practices notwithstanding, the pro-Kremlin daily Komsomolskaya Pravda interviewed a finalist from the show about the future of the war in Ukraine. She predicted the war would end by this spring.

“Our enemies, seeing the mood in society, including in the West, will try everything to outsmart us. But Russia is a great power and has learned from bitter experience, so it will not fall for their tricks again,” she said. “Our Vladimir Putin is a wise man. He sees right through people and will make well-considered decisions. These decisions will be announced in the coming months. I can say for sure: the goals and objectives of the special military operation, as originally formulated, will be achieved.”