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I .
. . wonder about evil. It would be easy to say the devil made me do
it!
 o begin to answer your question,
let’s recognize that the word evil essentially has two
meanings.
Evil as Something
Harmful
In its most general sense,
evil refers to something that is harmful or destructive. This
meaning focuses on the effects of something, not its origin. Hence, we read
in Job, “We accept good things from God, and should we not accept
evil?” (Job 2:10). The meaning here is that God can subject us to unpleasant
trials, if He wants; as Job himself discovered, however, God does
“evil” things not to be arrogant or mean but to serve the greater
good—which, from our limited perspective,
we cannot easily see.
Evil as the Refusal
to Serve God’s Will
The second, more specific—and
common—meaning of evil refers to the refusal to serve
God’s will. This is what caused the fall of Lucifer, the angel of light,
who is now called Satan, or “the devil.” When he fell, many other
angels followed him. Together, all these fallen angels, now called demons,
with Satan as their commander, epitomize evil. Unwilling to submit
to God’s authority, evil makes self-interest, at the expense of others,
into its own god.
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In its extreme,
this self-interest can be spoken of as wickedness—that is, something
harmful for its own sake, so as to exhibit cruel power. But it is just as
true, for example, to speak of those who follow lifestyles defiant of chastity
as being evil, for even though they may not have a conscious desire to harm
other individuals, they still do psychological and spiritual damage, and,
in it all, they defy the will of God. |
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Why Did God Make
Hell?
Why did God create hell? Why
does God allow people to go to hell? Some people get stuck on such questions
and, lacking any real theological wisdom, they decide for themselves that
God is “mean” and arbitrary and that they want nothing to do with
Him.
The true answer to these questions,
though, is something of a surprise.
Consider that when God created
all things, He gave all creatures free will
so that they could participate in love. In other words,
those who cannot refuse to love aren’t really capable of
love—they’re just robots. Real love, after all, is an act of will.
Without having free will, we could not love. So, in order to give all of
His creation the capacity to love, God gave all of His creation free
will.
So, there was Lucifer, an angel
with free will. And somehow he decided that he did not want to serve God
but rather wanted to serve himself. Maybe—just like many individuals
in the world today—he thought something like, “I resent the idea
of worshipping this God who created me. I want to be free to wield my power
for myself. I want to do what I want to do.”
Now, God, in the fullness of
His love, did not get mad. Instead, He must have said something like,
“All right. If you want to be your own king, I will give you a place
that you can have all for yourself in the company of those who choose to
follow you.” So, God created hell and gave it to Satan with the
understanding that anyone who wants to reject love for the sake of self-interest
is free to go to hell.
The astonishing thing about this
transaction is that the creation of hell is an act of God’s
mercy. Because it is absolutely too horrific to
contemplate any place entirely separated from
God, [1]
Satan received from God a place—hell—that still exists within
God’s love. The flames of hell are the flames of God’s love that
torment only those who have rejected love.
Furthermore, not being entirely
excluded from creation, Satan and his demons have the power of influence
over souls in this world. It’s perfectly fair—Satan has the free
will to tempt us to join him in hell, and we have the free will to accept
his seduction or, through faith and
love, empowered by the
sacraments, to reject it. We even have the
power, given by Christ Himself to His priests, to cast out demons from all
creatures.
Demonic Influence
or Mental Illness?
Many persons today—even
priests—propagate the false idea that when Jesus cast out demons He
was really curing a mental illness. But the truth is, Jesus knew the difference
between a demon and a psychological or medical problem. How could the
LORD Himself not know His own creation?
Moreover, our failing to recognize
this difference between a demon and a mental illness has led to many tragic
mistakes.
In the times before modern science,
it was believed that all mental illness was the result of demonic possession,
and the mentally ill were often treated like animals simply because no one
knew what to do with them. Physicians lacked the medical knowledge of psychology,
and they lacked the faith to cast out demons, so they were essentially
helpless.
In contrast, modern science sees
everything as a matter of brain chemistry, even to the point of ignoring
the psychology of the unconscious. Most modern physicians disavow all belief
in demons and wouldn’t recognize one even if he spit in their
faces.
But, in all truth, there
are demons and there is mental illness, and it would
do us well to understand the difference between them.
To understand this difference,
it is important first to understand the unconscious.
The
Unconscious
A brilliant French psychoanalyst,
Jacques Lacan, has explained the technical
aspects of the
 unconscious better than anyone. Lacan emphasized the
relation of language to unconscious functioning. Language, being metaphoric
and symbolic, is one step—one large step—removed from
“reality,” and in the gap between the
symbolic and the
real is all the deception, lies, and fraud
of human social existence.
Although it might seem, on the
surface, that our lives are structured simply by conscious thought and speech,
we are really more influenced by that gap between the real and the
symbolic—or, in other words, by what is “missing” from our
lives simply because we must filter all our raw experience (the Realm of
the Real) through our social dependence on an imperfect, and often dishonest,
use of language (the Realm of the Symbolic).
Therefore, the unconscious is
a side-effect, so to speak, of our separation from raw reality because our
use of language fails to adequately express our reality. Lacan saw clearly
that, because separation and lack lead to desire, the
unconscious is primarily governed by “the desire of the
Other”—that is, by the social world (the “Other”) around
us that is lost in its incomplete expression of reality. Consequently,
desire could be described as the unspoken—and
hidden—aspect of our speaking lives.
Therefore, the unconscious holds
the deepest—and often, the most ugly—truths about
ourselves.
Many persons therefore
fear the unconscious—some persons are afraid
of even the idea of having an unconscious—because they fear truth
itself.
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It’s similar
to the time at the beginning of modern medical science when doctors refused
to believe that bacteria caused infections. Not being able to see with their
own eyes any evidence of “germs” causing infection, these men
derisively dismissed the whole concept. |
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Nevertheless, let us be clear
about what the unconscious is not.
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The unconscious
is not something alien to ourselves. |
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The unconscious
is not, in itself, sinful. |
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The unconscious
is not, in itself, evil. |
Because of our unconscious
functioning, however, we are vulnerable to being influenced by
evil.
Vulnerability
to Evil through Psychological Defenses
You are vulnerable to the influence
of the devil and other demons in proportion to the extent that you are influenced
by unconscious psychological defenses. That’s
a powerful statement, so let’s explain
it.
Your psychological
defenses, like the psychological defenses of all of us, were created
in your childhood to protect your pride and ego in the face of
assaults [2]
from the world. Unless these defenses are altered through deep personal
scrutiny or
psychotherapy, however, they will
continue on into your adulthood, like sealed time capsules within your
unconscious mind, where they cause you, no matter how old you may be, to
act with the selfish desperation of a frightened and angry child.
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For some individuals,
defensive functioning becomes the predominant aspect of their being; thus
they lack “well-being” and are said to suffer from mental
“illness.” It’s an illness that must be cured not with medications
but by deciphering the psychological
meaning of those defenses. |
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Now, when you act with the selfish
desperation of a frightened and angry child, you are acting with a raw
self-interest that is very similar to the demonic refusal to serve God. In
this desperate state of mind you are thinking only of yourself; you aren’t
thinking clearly, and you certainly aren’t thinking about God, and so
you are vulnerable to falling under the influence of demons
(UID).
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Note that many
defenses are created specifically because of the intense emotional pain of
family dysfunction and hypocrisy. Quite commonly,
when a child is hurt and angry because of the failures
of his or her father, these defenses often seek
the unconscious satisfaction of undermining all paternal
authority—including the Church and, ultimately, God Himself. |
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The Desire for
Revenge
The easiest opening that evil
can follow into your heart is the path opened by your psychological defenses
in the desire to get revenge for injuries inflicted on you. If the injury
came from God (as a rebuke or a spiritual lesson), you, while Under the Influence
of Demons, will be angry at God, in spite of the opportunity for purification
He is giving you. If the injury came from wickedness, you, while Under the
Influence of Demons, will seek revenge against those who hurt you, and you
will use the justification that “The devil made me do it!”—and
most likely, because of spiritual blindness,
you will feel angry at God as well.
Because this desire for revenge
is often unconscious, rather than conscious, especially in regard to childhood
traumas, some persons might even say that because they live such pious lives
they are certain that they don’t want revenge on anyone. But unconsciously
they do desire revenge—and any of those behaviors that “the devil
made me do” are the evidence of UID, right along with all those sins
that keep getting repeated despite repeated
confessions.
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So, do you need
an exorcism? Well, maybe not. You can do quite
a bit to “exorcise” yourself simply by creating an environment
within your “house” that is boring to evil. It’s like when
a neighbor always comes to your house and helps himself to the soda or beer
in your refrigerator. You can put an end to the mooching just by not keeping
soda or beer in the fridge.
Therefore, in
regard to evil, don’t keep “revenge” in your house. That is,
purge from your house anything that breeds on the desire to “get even
with” others, such as social rudeness and cursing, competitive sports,
political arguing, and violent video games. Even though meanness, hostility,
and triumph are accepted hook, line, and sinker by our secular culture, they
have no spiritual value and are just breeding grounds for strife and hatred.
The same for addictions (smoking, drinking, drugs, gambling, pornography);
these things breed revenge because by hurting yourself you ultimately inflict
your hatred on society at large. |
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What Can You
Do?
Endeavor, therefore, to realize
that if you carry in your heart all sorts of
bitterness about past injuries and injustices, then,
when new trials afflict you, all that unconscious
bitterness in your heart will gush forth in anger
and revenge—along with envy, rivalry, pride, and on and on—and
you will fall right into all the snares of self-sabotage,
disobedience, and sin
that the devil has laid out for you.
On the other hand, if you decide
to purge your house of revenge, then follow it up with the
following:
If you do all these things, then
you truly will be serving God from the depths of your heart, and, like an
alcoholic convicted of driving under the influence
of alcohol who finally accepted treatment in a rehabilitation program and
became clean and sober, you will no longer be Under the Influence of
Demons.
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Do not let the
sun go down on your wrath; do not give the devil a chance to work on
you. |
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—Ephesians 4:27 |
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Three Final
Points
1. |
Not everyone who is mentally
ill is under the influence of demons. |
2. |
Not everyone who is under the
influence of (or even possessed by) demons is mentally ill. |
3. |
Some individuals are both mentally
ill and under the influence of (or even possessed by) demons. |
The following
advertisement is presented in compliance with the
San Francisco EOO (Equal Opportunity of Opinion)
Diversity Enhancement Ordinance BS7734:
Notes
1. See, for example, Saint Catherine of Genoa,
Treatise on Purgatory, Ch. IV: “The punishment of the damned
is not, it is true, infinite in degree, for the all-lovely goodness of God
shines even into hell. He who dies in mortal sin merits infinite woe for
an infinite duration; but the mercy of God has made the time only infinite,
and mitigated the intensity of the pain. In justice, He might have inflicted
much greater punishment than He has done.”
2. We are all constantly being “assaulted”
by others around us in their desires to get from us what will most
benefit their self-interests. And so the unconscious motive to satisfy
others will often conflict with our basic need for self-preservation. Moreover,
in addition to these social demands, the physical world around us often assaults
us through accidents and natural disasters. Therefore we all must deal with
constant emotional conflict or internal or external “assaults”
on our well-being.
Common ways of protecting ourselves emotionally
were called mechanisms by Sigmund Freud. When seen in pathological
settings, these mechanisms can technically be called defense mechanisms;
when seen in everyday life, they can be more properly called dynamic
mechanisms. Modern psychiatry, however, uses the term defense
mechanism in both pathological and everyday settings.
In contrast, Catholic theology teaches us to lay down
our weapons of self-protection and to trust entirely in God: Our help
is in the name of the LORD, Who made heaven and earth
(Psalm 124:8).
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