Daylight Atheism » Demonology

Treating Demon Possession with Antipsychotics

Ebonmuse — Wed, 30 Mar 2011 10:56:25 +0000

As I've written in the past, modern Christianity has never outgrown the demoniac fixation of its founders, who believed that evil spirits were constantly on the prowl and assaulting them. People like Gary Collins - an evangelical, a clinical psychologist, and the head of a 15,000-member association of Christian counselors - still believes, based not on evidence but on his "theological beliefs", that demons exist ... [visit site to read more]

Jehovah's Witnesses Hate the Smurfs

Ebonmuse — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 18:41:49 +0000

By Sarah Braasch

In the early 80's, the primary preoccupations of the Jehovah's Witnesses were Armageddon, Smurfs, Michael Jackson and demonic attack, but not necessarily in that order. As a young Jehovah's Witness girl, my worldview was what you might describe as surreal. Smurfs were little blue imps disguised as Saturday morning cartoon characters. They were capable of murder, rape, violence and general mayhem, and, as such, all Smurf paraphernalia had to be either banished or ... [visit site to read more]

The Witch Children of Nigeria

Ebonmuse — Mon, 17 Dec 2007 13:38:40 +0000

I've written on several past occasions about how belief in malignant supernatural forces causes real harm to real people. There are examples of this from every region of the world, but some of the most wrenching are from Africa, where Biblical beliefs about demons and evil spirits still run rampant.

In January, I wrote about the witch camps of Ghana, where people suspected of using black magic to harm their neighbors ... [visit site to read more]

Emptying the Haunted Air

Ebonmuse — Sat, 27 Oct 2007 16:47:31 +0000

Almost two hundred years ago, the English Romantic poet John Keats wrote a poem, "Lamia", in which he lamented that the advance of scientific understanding would rob the world of its beauty and wonder. Keats' chief villain, though not named in the poem, was Isaac Newton, whose use of the prism to split white light into its component colors was viewed by Keats as akin to desecration:

Do not all charms fly
At the mere ... [visit site to read more]

Why Does God Let Satan Roam Free?

Ebonmuse — Wed, 08 Aug 2007 01:38:31 +0000

"Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour."

—1 Peter 5:8

"Only-begotten Son, seest thou what rage
Transports our Adversary? whom no bounds
Prescribed, no bars of Hell, nor all the chains
Heaped on him there, nor yet the main Abyss
Wide interrupt, can hold..."

—John Milton, Paradise Lost, Book III

One of the aspects of Christian ... [visit site to read more]

Rebuking the Devil

Ebonmuse — Fri, 06 Apr 2007 15:33:19 +0000

I have written several times in the past about how religious superstition, when it is taken seriously, causes harm and suffering to real people by dissuading them from seeking the evidence-based treatments they need. But a new story from the March 31 edition of Newsday, Trying to change minds in the Congo, is one of the most horrifying illustrations of this principle ... [visit site to read more]

Witch Hysteria Is Alive and Well

Ebonmuse — Sat, 27 Jan 2007 19:50:29 +0000

One of the great tragedies of the human species is the violence and turmoil still happening in Africa. Africa is the continent of our origins, the place of our species' birth, and the one place on Earth to which everyone now living can trace their ultimate ancestry. It should be a place of peace and human togetherness, an enduring and living monument to our past. Instead, the continent is still struggling to overcome the shameful legacy of colonialism and its own ethnic divisions, and ... [visit site to read more]