Does Evil Exist

Does Evil Exist?

On the surface, this may seem to be a rhetorical question. After all, a quick look at any newspaper, any newscast will provide the answer to that question. If you need more proof, all you have to do is ask any police officer or any hospital ER worker. They deal with evil on a daily basis. Indeed, it is a terrible reality in their work. They are forced to see the worst that humankind has to offer. However, the question that needs to be answered is whether there is a palpable evil, an intelligence if you will, behind the atrocities that man all too often commits. Many will argue that there is no such thing as a devil. Perhaps they are right. However, for the sake of all of us, I hope they are wrong.

This may sound like an unusual thing for someone to say, especially someone who deals with the world of the demonic for a living. After all, why would anyone want a devil to exist? Is it a feeble attempt to justify my career choice? Well, consider the alternative. Suppose there is no such thing as the devil, no such thing as an evil intelligence. If that were true, then we would be faced with the knowledge that man himself is inherently evil. That thought scares me more than anything else. Is man, by his nature, capable of such horror, such atrocities? May God help us all if that is true.

There has been much said about the coming millennium. We all know about the predicted, sometimes ridiculously so, Y2K problems. Computers will shut down; savings accounts will disappear although no one has predicted that my Visa bill will do likewise. We have been led to believe that food will be scarce, electricity will be shut off, hospitals will shut down. The list goes on and on. However, let me tell you what bothers me more than any of that. Here we are at the end of the 20^th century and you know what, we are dropping bombs on an entire country to keep the leaders of that country from slaughtering and raping and "cleansing" a huge segment of their population. Does that scare you? It should, especially when you stop to think about the fact that the people committing the atrocities which led to this situation profess to be Christians. History has shown that more atrocities have been committed in the name of God than for any other reason. This is not to say that the crisis in the Balkans is a religious war, it only serves to illustrate that these atrocities are being committed by people who claim to believe in the message of Christ. How can anyone believe in Christ and still carry out such horror? How can we, at the end of this millennium, still be killing each other? Have we learned nothing?

I want to believe, I have to believe that these acts and the many other horror stories we see are at the very least, inspired by something inhuman. Is man alone, left to his own devices, capable of such cruelty? Stop and think about something here. We are at the end of the bloodiest century in the history of man. Right now, there are bombs falling on Serbia, bombs continue to fly in Iraq and India and Pakistan are at war. These are but a few of the tensions, which could very well lead to World War III. Does anyone think there will be much left of the world if that happens? If there is one thing we have learned to do this century, it is this: we have learned to kill and to do so quickly and efficiently. Furthermore, we are trying to improve our ability to do so. Just look at what Iraq is up to. There can be only one answer. There has to be a devil and he is using us to do what he cannot do himself. He cannot hurt God except through us. Therefore, he pushes and nudges and inspires us to go after each other. If you cannot hurt God Himself, then it makes sense to hurt those closest to God. There is a brilliant strategy here if one chooses to look carefully.

Perhaps you are still not convinced. That is fair enough, so let us take this a bit further. I mentioned Christianity earlier but there have been many masters throughout the history of humankind. They have come preaching from different angles and they have taught using different names. Whether you are talking about Christ, Allah or masters of any other name, the message has been the same: Love one another. Sounds kind of simple, doesn't it? However, it has not worked. Either there is a Satan, attempting to foil God's plans or humankind is incredibly stupid. Which would you prefer to believe? Let us take a look closer to home. The recent killings in Colorado have focused national attention to school violence. However twisted one's thinking might be, I have a hard time believing that the ordinary pressure of the teenage years would result in a tragedy of that proportion. In my mind, Satan's influence had a hand in that tragedy. Am I trying to say that this killing was the result of demonic possession? No, I am not, although I have not heard any better explanations.

However, Satan does not necessarily work directly. His influence, although tangible, is well hidden. He likes to work behind the scenes. Now before you write me off as some kind of religious lunatic, consider this: Satan's greatest strategy is to convince humankind that he does not exist. That is his number one strategy. The more we deny his existence, the more we fall victim to his strategy. With every denial, he grows stronger. If you believe nothing else I say, believe that. He has worked very hard throughout history to keep himself hidden. Sadly, those with the most knowledge, the most power and the greatest opportunity to teach the masses have played right into his hands. Most organized religions consider Satan to be little more than folklore. When confronted with his actions, they do their best to ignore the problem in the hopes that it will go away. It does- but always at a price.

This is not a discourse on demonic possession. Trust me when I tell you it exists. Yes, he does send demons to possess people. During exorcisms when these demons are asked why they were dispatched to possess someone, the answer is always the same: One can kill many. However, the point here is that Satan does his best work when he acts subtly. He is most efficient when he orchestrates the action. He is the tempter, the director, if you will. He will take our weaknesses and our fears and he will use them against us. He knows just what buttons to push to get us to carry out his evil. He is very good at what he does. For the most part, we are easy prey for him. After all, a huge segment of the population does not believe he exists. You cannot combat something that you do not believe exists. However, if humankind is to survive, we had better start believing and we had better do that soon. I am not saying that the world is about to end tomorrow, far from it. What I am saying is that the world is getting more dangerous by the day. The evil we do is becoming more common, more cruel. How long can this world continue to spiral out of control?

In our cities, we often live behind bars designed to keep the bad people out. We are, in effect, prisoners in our own homes. Drugs and crime rule the streets. Our children are no longer safe in their schools. There is a viciousness in our youth that is beyond frightening. Gangs are turning our streets into war zones. Our children have learned to kill with an ease that is terrifying. How far will it go? How bad can it become? I do not want to sound like a holy roller here but the fact of the matter is that far too many people operate without a conscience. There are way too many people who have no regard for their fellow man. I have to believe that these people lack any spiritual beliefs whatsoever. Could someone who believes in God show such disregard for those around them? I should think not. Nature abhors a vacuum and any void will be filled by something. If you lack a belief in God, there is a good chance that Satan will step in to fill that void.

We see atrocities committed every day. However, what scares me so much is that we have become desensitized to these acts. We will hear crime statistics, read about mass murders and we barely blink an idea. We may make some comment, maybe something like "What a world!" and not miss a beat. Have we seen so much that we are no longer affected by what we see? I am afraid that could be so. I am also afraid that somehow, in some way, Satan is responsible for much of it. Still, I would rather believe that than accept the possibility that we, as a race are so capable of evil.

However, I must make one extremely important point here. While I do believe that Satan is behind much of the evil in this world, there is a danger in blaming everything that happens on him. When we use Satan as an excuse, there is a danger that we will do so to avoid accepting responsibility for our actions. "The devil made me do it" speech does not wash. We must always remember that we alone are responsible for our actions. Does it sound like I am contradicting myself? The thing is that I do believe that Satan bears much of the blame but we were blessed with free will and we all know what is right and what is wrong. Satan may push and prod us but again, we alone are responsible for our actions. We need to give the devil his due but no more than that.

Can we stop all of the violence in the world? No, we cannot although I do not know why this is so. However, we must all do what we can to make the world a little better. We need to believe in God and we must at least try to live his word. We need to stop and think about what we are going to do before we do it. We must also accept the fact that Satan and his evil exists and consciously plan to combat him. It is time to take our heads out of the sand. If we do that, we will have taken a major step in the right direction. If more people accepted the fact that Satan does exist and that he tries to influence us every day, we might pay more attention to what we do. With every questionable action, we must ask ourselves this: "Who does this serve, God or Satan?"

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