[Magdalen] Exorcism

[James Oppenheimer-Crawford]

Well, I have certainly experienced real palpable evil.  Some people are so
far gone beyond the act of merely failing to weigh choices correctly that
one senses almost a visceral dread of the stuff these people come up with.
Yes indeed, we are capable of incredible depths of depravity all by
ourselves.  We don't need help going there, sad to say.



James W. Oppenheimer-Crawford
*“A life is like a garden. Perfect moments can be had, but not preserved,
except in memory. LLAP**”  -- *Leonard Nimoy

On Wed, Dec 9, 2015 at 7:57 AM, Sally Davies <sally.davies at gmail.com> wrote:

> Me too, Arthur.
>
> It's also interesting that in my environment of Africa, few people inside
> the churches or even outside them are inclined to question the
> independent existence of evil and of evil entities. It doesn't sit
> comfortably with rationality but in this part of the world the supernatural
> and the natural are not separated to the same extent as in the "rational"
> West.
>
> I don't understand it, but there again I don't understand most of Reality
> and that's OK.
>
> My main problem with all of this is not so much philosophy or theodicy but
> psychology. I'm a devotee and servant of the human brain in all its
> miraculous strangeness, including its ability to connect with other brains
> in ways that aren't obvious to the five senses or easily explained.
>
> It so aggravating when phenomena that are much more elegantly explained by
> recourse to these lesser known psycho-social competencies and
> vulnerabilities, are ascribed to either God or the Devil.
>
> I don't mean to imply that this leaves us with a "Satan of the gaps". To my
> mind, one of Satan's cleverest tricks is to get us searching for Hannibal
> Lector when someone like Donald Trump is a much more worthy candidate. He's
> convinced a lot of people to believe in the "light" he claims to be shining
> on Reality (Truth is completely irrelevant in his campaign) - and they will
> give him the highest power in the land if they have the chance. Screwtape
> and his team must be well pleased with him!!
>
> Ian: you asked the original question, what do you think of The Screwtape
> Letters?
>
> Sally D
>
> On Wednesday, December 9, 2015, Arthur Laurent <ALaurent at npr.org> wrote:
>
> > I believe in the devil and other creatures of pure evil, because I've
> been
> > in the presence of evil, and was glad when I could walk away. This is not
> > an intellectual belief (none of my spiritual beliefs are intellectual),
> but
> > is based on personal experience.
> >
> > James wrote, "...Thinking one can behave their way into heaven is an
> > insult to the whole idea of salvation," and I agree. There is nothing we
> > can do by ourselves that will get us into heaven. That's why we have
> Jesus
> > as our Advocate.
> >
> > Of course, some of us are going to take a lot more advocacy than others.
> >
> > Arthur
>