The modern world
has had a serious problem confronting the afterlife at all as part of a
rational worldview. A large part of that
derives from almost antique notions that have themselves not been properly
recast.
The fundamental
problem for everyone is that we have first personified GOD and this naturally
leads to personifying SATAN. It is
better to understand both as separate magnets to attract human intentions first
of the physical mind and through that to modify the spirit. I think that we can all agree that it is
possible to be attracted to behavior and ideas that can be characterized as
either good or evil. It is through the
exercise of free will that we choose to cleave to one or the other however we
might individually rationalize our behavior.
None of this
solves the real problem which is how to handle spirits which are all departed
from physical existence but still for various reasons hang around. In practice, it appears that the majority do
remain engaged with the physical but positively. That of course has its own dangers. It allows those spirits engaged in ill intent
ample scope to meddle and cause damage.
What can be said is that we are surrounded with spirits that are good,
bad and indifferent, but not much better informed than they were in life.
We ourselves are
coming to a vastly deeper understanding of the nature of spirit and soul and
ultimately of GOD. What can be said is
that spirit and partly soul can be personified as derived from a formerly
living human being. Soul is thought to
be the incorruptible part of our existence that the spirit cannot touch or
alter. At least this is all beginning to
become rigorous.
The rediscovery
of evil spirits is one thing and not so much use by itself. Their removal from a victim has proven value
which is why we suddenly see a blossoming of demand. There is obviously something to remove and
deal with and it is typically scary.
Ayahuasca therapy is also a powerful tool for isolating and neutralizing
evil spirits and also clearly visualizing them.
Thus this simple enough idea is a powerful method for tackling
intractable mental health issues.
In the meantime
the Pope is embracing this movement and reminding us all that a belief in the
afterlife is hardly improved by arguing either souls or spirits do not exist
when it is patently clear that one implies the other and the last time I
checked, this is about religion. Thus
accepting Godhood implies the individual spirit and the purity of the soul and
thus we open the question of the geography of the afterlife of which a great
deal of revelation is available.
In the meantime
the fervently secular crowd obviously does not know what to make of any of
this.
A
modern pope gets old school on the Devil
VATICAN CITY — A darling of
liberal Catholics and an advocate of inclusion and forgiveness, Pope Francis is
hardly known for fire and brimstone.
Yet, in his words and
deeds, the new pope is locked in an epic battle with the oldest enemy of God
and creation:
The Devil.
After his little more than
a year atop the Throne of St. Peter, Francis’s teachings on Satan are already
regarded as the most old school of any pope since at least Paul VI, whose
papacy in the 1960s and 1970s fully embraced the notion of hellish forces
plotting to deliver mankind unto damnation.
Largely under the radar,
theologians and Vatican insiders say, Francis has not only dwelled far more on Satan in sermons and
speeches than his recent predecessors have, but also sought to rekindle the
Devil’s image as a supernatural entity with the forces of evil at his beck and
call.
Last year, for instance,
Francis laid hands on a man in a wheelchair
who claimed to be possessed by demons, in what many saw as an impromptu act of
cleansing. A few months later, he praised a group long viewed by some as the
crazy uncles of the Roman Catholic Church — the International Association of
Exorcists — for “helping people who suffer and are in need of liberation.”
“ ‘But Father, how
old-fashioned you are to speak about the Devil in the 21st century,’ ” Francis,
quoting those who have noted his frequent mentions of the Devil, said last
month while presiding over Mass at the Vatican’s chapel in St. Martha’s House.
He warned those gathered on that chilly morning to be vigilant and not be
fooled by the hidden face of Satan in the modern world. “Look out because the
Devil is present,” he said.
Since its foundation, the
church has taught the existence of the Devil. But in recent decades,
progressive priests and bishops, particularly in the United States and Western
Europe, have tended to couch Satan in more allegorical terms. Evil became
less the wicked plan of the master of hell than the nasty byproduct of
humanity’s free will. Even Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI, a lofty German
theologian, often painted evil with a broad brush.
Enter the plain-talking
first pope from Latin America, where mystical views of Satan still hold sway in
broad areas of the region. During his time as cardinal of Buenos Aires before
rising to the papacy, Francis was known for stark warnings against “the
tempter” and “the father of lies.” Now, his focus on the Devil is raising
eyebrows even within the normally unquestioning walls of Vatican City.
“Pope Francis never stops
talking about the Devil; it’s constant,” said one senior bishop in Vatican City
who spoke on the condition of anonymity in order to speak freely. “Had Pope
Benedict done this, the media would have clobbered him.”
Yet, as with so many of his
actions, Francis may simply be correctly reading the winds of the Catholic
Church.
Rising demand for exorcists
Although it is difficult to
measure, Vatican officials talk about a resurgence of mystical rites in the
church, including exorcism — or the alleged act of evicting demons from a
living host. Cardinals in Milan; Turin, Italy; and Madrid, for instance,
recently moved to expand the number of exorcists in their dioceses to cope with
what they have categorized as surging demand.
But by focusing on
old-school interpretations of the Devil, some progressive theologians complain,
the pope is undermining his reputation as a leader who in so many other ways
appears to be more in step with modern society than his predecessor.
“He is opening the door to
superstition,” said Vito Mancuso, a Catholic theologian and writer.
Among the things lurking
behind that door is the alleged gateway to hell guarded by the small cluster of
officially anointed exorcists of the Roman Catholic Church.
By most accounts, the ranks
of official exorcists number between 500 and 600 in a global church of more
than 1 billion Catholics, with the vast majority operating in Latin America and
Eastern Europe. This week, at the ninth and largest Vatican-sanctioned convention on exorcism, attendees gushed about the fresh recognition being afforded the
field.
Almost 200 delegates — most
of them priests and nuns — from more than two dozen nations talked about how
Satanic cults are spreading like wildfire in the age of the Internet.
The new pope, exorcists
say, has become their champion in the face of modern skeptics, many of them
within the Catholic faith. Officially, those claiming to be possessed must
first undergo psychiatric evaluations. But exorcists say that liberal Catholic
bishops have often rejected their services even after such due diligence.
“The sad truth is that
there are many bishops and priests in our church who do not really believe in
the Devil,” said the Rev. Gabriele Amorth, the 89-year-old priest who is
perhaps the closest thing the church has to a Hollywood-style exorcist. “I
believe Pope Francis is speaking to them. Because when you don’t believe, the
Devil wins.”
During the conference, the
Rev. Cesar Truqui, an exorcist based in Switzerland, recounted one experience
he had aboard a Swissair flight. “Two lesbians,” he said, had sat behind him on
the plane. Soon afterward, he said, he felt Satan’s presence. As he silently
sought to repel the evil spirit through prayer, one of the women, he said,
began growling demonically and threw chocolates at his head.
Asked how he knew the woman
was possessed, he said that “once you hear a Satanic growl, you never forget
it. It’s like smelling Margherita pizza for the first time. It’s something you
never forget.”
From his small room in a
south Rome rectory fitted with a hospital bed, Amorth praised Francis for so
fully embracing the biblical notion of the Devil as the personified overlord of
hell.
Unlike in the movies, he
said, the process of driving demons out typically takes multiple sessions over
many years.
An exorcist in action
In a rare glimpse of an
official exorcism last week, in a white-tiled room outfitted with images of
Jesus Christ and the Virgin Mary, Amorth wrapped his purple sash around a
Neapolitan housewife in her 40s who said she was afflicted by multiple demons.
He then began chanting in Latin, commanding the devils inside her to reveal
themselves.
“Tell me your name!” he
demanded.
“No, no,” hissed the woman,
shaking her head and speaking in an altered voice as her eyes rolled to the
back of her head. “I will not!”
“Tell me your name!” he
kept repeating, until finally she spat out, “Asmodeus,” the name of an ancient
demon and hellish spokesman.
“How many are you?” he
yelled, repeating the question as she grunted and shook her head violently.
Finally, she defiantly
said, “We are five!”
After his bout with the
demons, the diminutive Amorth simply shrugged.
“That,” he said, “was a
light one.”
Following the session, the
woman and her husband, who gave their names only as Antonella and Michele, said
they had been going through a living hell for years. They had begged bishops to
authorize an exorcism when Antonella began having uncontrollable fits after
receiving Holy Communion and became violent around religious prayers. But they
were repeatedly denied.
It was only after they were
referred to Amorth and began sessions four years ago, Antonella said, that her
condition finally began to improve.
“The Devil exists, and
thanks to this treatment, I have gotten back my faith,” she said. “I think Pope
Francis is telling us it’s okay to believe.”
No comments:
Post a Comment