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Shocked: Randall Sullivan (left) and Michelle Gomez (right) were left horrified by what they witnessed
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Grim: A shaman pours the fresh blood of a chicken onto a worshipper's forehead as part of the dark ceremony
The lakeside town of Catemaco on Mexico's Gulf Coast is a destination for many 'pilgrims' who come in search of spiritual experiences.
Enrique Vernon organises the annual mass at his ceremonial grounds on White Monkey Mountain to the west of the town.
'Our black magic stems from Native American Olmeca culture, and we are experts in calling upon the devil and his dark power', said chief shaman Enrique Verdon, who wears a dead anteater on his head.
'People come to our devil-summoning ceremonies when they want to achieve change in their lives', he told the MailOnline in his office decorated with figures of the skeletal Saint Death, pentagrams and pelts of exotic animals.
'Some come to ask Satan to give them success in the future, others come to get over their difficult pasts'.
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Belief: Chief shaman Enrique Verdon said: 'Some come to ask Satan to give them success in the future, others come to get over their difficult pasts'
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Smeared: Chief shaman Enrique Verdon said: 'The blood pumped from a still-beating heart is the purest form of energy'
'Our marriage is failing, and this is something we both have faith in', said Alejandro Montes, shortly before he and his wife smeared the blood of a sacrificed goat over their faces in an attempt to save their relationship.
The pair had travelled to Catemaco from Monterrey in northern Mexico in order to pledge their souls to Satan in return for a happy marriage.
'We've tried everything and this is our last resort', said Alejandro, whose extramarital affair had strained their union. 'I'm willing to put my soul on the line to prove my commitment'.
A total of eight people underwent the ritual last week. Many witnesses were present at the ceremony, including a number of international tourists who had come to Mexico specifically to witness the black mass.
Randall Sullivan, a visitor from Portland, Oregon had heard of the event through his involvement in spiritualistic circles, and had come to witness the spectacle.
'I want to know how these shamans work their magic', he said before the ceremony.
'They are the only people I've head of who can mix black and white magic, that's like mixing God and the Devil'.
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Tradition: A total of eight satanic priests had come from across Mexico to conduct the ceremony below a full moon
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Costume: The lakeside town of Catemaco on Mexico's Gulf Coast is a destination for many 'pilgrims' who come in search of spiritual experiences
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Mystical: Samuel Casella, an Italian tourist from Milan, said: 'I expect to see something incredible tonight'
'It's something very mystical', said Samuel Casella, an Italian tourist from Milan. 'I expect to see something incredible tonight'.
A total of eight satanic priests had come from across Mexico to conduct the ceremony below a full moon.
'We are all powerful individuals. Some are healers, others are destroyers', said Joyri Ra, a devil worshipper from southern Mexico who wears a necklace made of human finger bones.
'Tonight we are going to open the portal to another dimension so that those who ask to communicate with Satan will be heard'.
The ceremony began with a group of teenage girls, all dressed in black underwear, carrying the terrified sacrificial offerings along a candlelit path to the main altar: a font filled with burning charcoal onto which the waiting shamans would throw handfuls of putrid herbs.
'The girls must be virgins, and be both mentally and physically pure', said Roselia Belli, a 'black witch' who uses strong tobacco and piercing screams in her own exorcism ceremonies, for which she charges clients more than £200 an hour.
Those who had come to plead their cases to Satan were called forward and ordered to kneel before the shamans, who wrung the necks and removed the heads of chickens before pouring the birds' blood over the kneeling penitents' heads.
'The blood pumped from a still-beating heart is the purest form of energy', chief shaman Enrique Verdon told the horrified crowd.
'These animals have to die so that we can continue our spiritual work.'
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Young: The ceremony began with a group of teenage girls, all dressed in black underwear, carrying the terrified sacrificial offerings along a candlelit path to the main altar
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Pure: Roselia Belli, a 'black witch', said: 'The girls must be virgins, and be both mentally and physically pure'
'Their blood will be offered up to the dark powers', he said, shrouded by the thick smoke billowing out of the fiery altar over which the decapitated chickens were held once bled dry.
'We are calling upon Satan, the prince of the Earth, to appear before us'.
The sacrifice of animals for display has been outlawed in the state of Veracruz, but is nevertheless still widely practiced in the devil-worshipping communities of the rural areas where this ceremony took place.
'There's little we can do to stop them', Arturo Bermudez Zaruta, the chief of police for Veracruz state told the MailOnline in a telephone interview the next day.
'If these people want to make displays of cruelly murdering animals, they'll do it whether it's legal or not'.
'This sacred blood give us the energy and spiritual power we need to make our black magic', said Enrique Verdon, as he cut the throat of the final sacrificial offering: a screaming goat whose blood was collected in a bronze jar to be passed around.
