Exorcism?

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

Any shaman who performs an exorcism deserves to be beaten with hammers.

Boru

[Mister Agenda]

I've never heard of a materialist getting possessed by a spirit.

[Paleophyte]

We all have our demons to fight in this world. Right?

Wrong. That's what we call allegories, metaphors, and idioms. We all have challenges to overcome. There are no angels or demons. That means that exorcism is little more than beating somebody until they aren't crazy anymore. About as counterproductive as you'd expect and possibly the worst psychotherapy ever. But that's about what you'd expect from the champions of conversion therapy and burning people who have seizures.

[The Grand Nudger]

It’s more subtle than that.
 
Yes I happen to agree with most of the things you people say. I was talking about the reality as “energy” about what we call the Devil. So when the author (who was a psychiatrist) says that “he looked Satan in the eyes” during one of the two exorcism events that he witnessed, I kind of understand his point because he explains it in a detailed manner in the book as a whole.

You clearly don't.  Scott Peck was a psychiatrist but he was also a christian nut who believed in a literal devil..not an air quote devil.  
 

In a nutshell: We all have our demons to fight in this world. Right? So when we talk about our personal demons the one fact is that these are not here not to negatively influence you. It’s there to destroy you and take a few other people with you if it can. Think of (rather grown up people issues) like addictions, bad habits, other spiritual problems and life issues that tend to stick around until you are able to resolve them and get to the next stage of your spiritual development.

Scott Peck believed that a foreign intelligence, the devil of christian mythology, literally possessed people.  
 

   So “personal Evil” is that kind of phenomenon. You can’t measure it. You can do scientific experiments on it but if you happen to be a life coach or a psychotherapist you tend to be aware of these “forces” and work with them every day of your professional life.
 
    I didn’t say anything new to anyone until this point.
 
    But the author here indicates that something happened in the two exorcism rituals that he had witnessed first-hand. And that those two guys would have probably died without these ceremonies (and he is saying this as a psychiatrist). So I was a little shocked and wanted to open the debate here

The air quotes again, lol.  We don't need to air quote this stuff because we don't need to use it as a euphemism for something else.  Personal evil is just that.  It's not a force or an energy or a foreign spirit.  Peck shows how completely he jumped the shark in his superstitious christianism by positing that a magical ritual with no actual effects was necessary to anyone's survival. A debate about the efficacy of magic over medicine is pointless. You're impressed because a nut couches his belief in faith healing in his professional credentials but having professional credentials has never been a barrier to believing silly shit. Particularly that silly shit which was already a part of your culture before your first day at school. You are impressed by it not because of those professional credentials but because it validates the mythology that you yourself cling to - if you squint just right and ignore the fact that Peck having made a strong christian commitment -in his own words- would tell you that you're a nut and a devil worshipper yourself.

We have debates about evil and morality in general from time to time on the boards but at no point in a discussion about possession or exorcism or boogeymen are we talking about moral failures or their various causes.

[Sheldon]

Worth noting, this is a scene supposedly of an actual exorcism from the documentary The Devil and Father Amorth.





And, somehow, despite trying for extreme realism (no crew, no lighting, and supposedly no more than a single camera, despite several instances where he clearly cuts to another angle without missing a beat) William Friedkin decided to add some obvious sound editing.

Overall, it seems like the victim is just playing a part. It does not look like the power of Christ is legitimately compelling her at any point.

She has a future in B rated movies playing someone who's possessed, the sound editing was a nice touch, but unnecessary, as even were it her own voice, all we would have is something we can't explain. Just as you seemingly can't explain to those determined to indulge irrational superstition, that mysteries by definition, have no explanatory powers.

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

Anyone who thinks they’re ’possessed’ by ‘demons’ would be better off with sound psychiatric care (with or without antipsychotics) than with this exorcism rubbish.

Boru

[Leonardo17]

It’s more subtle than that.
 
Yes I happen to agree with most of the things you people say. I was talking about the reality as “energy” about what we call the Devil. So when the author (who was a psychiatrist) says that “he looked Satan in the eyes” during one of the two exorcism events that he witnessed, I kind of understand his point because he explains it in a detailed manner in the book as a whole.

You clearly don't.  Scott Peck was a psychiatrist but he was also a christian nut who believed in a literal devil..not an air quote devil.  
 

In a nutshell: We all have our demons to fight in this world. Right? So when we talk about our personal demons the one fact is that these are not here not to negatively influence you. It’s there to destroy you and take a few other people with you if it can. Think of (rather grown up people issues) like addictions, bad habits, other spiritual problems and life issues that tend to stick around until you are able to resolve them and get to the next stage of your spiritual development.

Scott Peck believed that a foreign intelligence, the devil of christian mythology, literally possessed people.  
 

   So “personal Evil” is that kind of phenomenon. You can’t measure it. You can do scientific experiments on it but if you happen to be a life coach or a psychotherapist you tend to be aware of these “forces” and work with them every day of your professional life.
 
    I didn’t say anything new to anyone until this point.
 
    But the author here indicates that something happened in the two exorcism rituals that he had witnessed first-hand. And that those two guys would have probably died without these ceremonies (and he is saying this as a psychiatrist). So I was a little shocked and wanted to open the debate here

The air quotes again, lol.  We don't need to air quote this stuff because we don't need to use it as a euphemism for something else.  Personal evil is just that.  It's not a force or an energy or a foreign spirit.  Peck shows how completely he jumped the shark in his superstitious christianism by positing that a magical ritual with no actual effects was necessary to anyone's survival.  A debate about the efficacy of magic over medicine is pointless.  You're impressed because a nut couches his belief in faith healing in his professional credentials but having professional credentials has never been a barrier to believing silly shit.  Particularly that silly shit which was already a part of your culture before your first day at school.  You are impressed by it not because of those professional credentials but because it validates the mythology that you yourself cling to - if you squint just right and ignore the fact that Peck having made a strong christian commitment -in his own words- would tell you that you're a nut and a devil worshipper yourself.  

We have debates about evil and morality in general from time to time on the boards but at no point in a discussion about possession or exorcism or boogeymen are we talking about moral failures or their various causes.

“You clearly don't.  Scott Peck was a psychiatrist but he was also a christian nut who believed in a literal devil..not an air quote devil.”
 
- I don’t know if he was a Christian. I think he has a more Jungian type of approach on these matters + He is clearly a spiritual person (who believes in higher realities, spiritual growth and all that)
 
“Scott Peck believed that a foreign intelligence, the devil of christian mythology, literally possessed people.”
 
- Not really. You can check this “People of the lie” or the Wikipedia page of the Author. What he is attempting is to create a scientific approach to the study of Evil. Which today (40 years later) is defined by psychologists as “severe personality disorders like narcissism and/or sociopathy”. So I don’t know about where to draw the line but Narcissistic people and / or sociopaths are evil people. We don’t need to believe in the Gospels to say that. But what a narcissistic partner does to his wife or her husband is pure and simple evil. Which is different from some other psychiatric conditions in which the harm that is done by the individual to himself or others occurs because of a malfunctioning brain or lack of balance in the neurochemical situation of that person. (at least that’s the current theory). Some people do things “willingly”, sometimes groups of people commit atrocities (like the My Lai Massacre for instance). And Scott Peck is one of the pioneers who is studying the issue as something that occurs “willingly” without basing Evil on some sort of causality or anything like that.
 
/And yes. Religions have been talking about this for millennia. So this is a Christian theory of some sort.
 
Final Part:
 
   Well, you may be right. My approach on this subject is mostly based on local theology + we don’t like to focus on these subjects too much. 1) Because of the issues you are talking about. 2) Because even those who truly believe in exorcism are saying that’s it’s a very rare phenomenon. 3) Because we are supposed to focus on the positive (Good thoughts, good deeds, constructive action and all that )
 
   Still if you happen to be interested in these issues this and other books of Scott Peck are very interesting 

[The Grand Nudger]

Now you're laundering this nuts reputation. Yes, Scott Peck really believed that a literal devil possesses people, based mostly on folk tales about and by a catholic witchdoctor. That's the conclusion he came to.

Not the only weirdass thing he believed, either. He was one of the helpful werewolves who was behind the christian counseling movement that's gone on to fuck up who knows how many people who go out looking for medicine and get fairy tales instead. Much science, very rigorous. He's not studying anything now. He's been dead for twenty years.

[Leonardo17]

There are those schools of religious psychotherapy. Personally, I think it can be used as a complementary method after the patient has seen a real psychiatrist. It’s not one or the other. Otherwise it’s self-harm.
 
   People like Scott Peck and Wayne Dyer are more like people who specialize in self-help book with many new spiritually oriented ideas. These are all very interesting approaches. But again, they will add-up to more conventional treatments if the patient happens to be interested in the subject.
 
   Scott Peck’s ideas on exorcism are not that different from these approaches. He describes it as a from of brainwashing that will ultimately push that “thing” out of your system and allow you to improve your quality of life.
 
    Personally, I am not entirely hostile to such alternate approaches because I gave up smoking with the BRT method. Many people are sceptic on these approaches that are based on something called bio-energy. Most people won’t even give it try and invest money on that. But I am still a smoke-free person since almost 10 years now.
 
   So on some issues (like true acts of exorcism) I sort of try to remain cautiously sceptic while still exploring the possibility for it to be real on some level. 

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

There are those schools of religious psychotherapy. Personally, I think it can be used as a complementary method after the patient has seen a real psychiatrist. It’s not one or the other. Otherwise it’s self-harm.
 
   People like Scott Peck and Wayne Dyer are more like people who specialize in self-help book with many new spiritually oriented ideas. These are all very interesting approaches. But again, they will add-up to more conventional treatments if the patient happens to be interested in the subject.
 
   Scott Peck’s ideas on exorcism are not that different from these approaches. He describes it as a from of brainwashing that will ultimately push that “thing” out of your system and allow you to improve your quality of life.
 
    Personally, I am not entirely hostile to such alternate approaches because I gave up smoking with the BRT method. Many people are sceptic on these approaches that are based on something called bio-energy. Most people won’t even give it try and invest money on that. But I am still a smoke-free person since almost 10 years now.
 
   So on some issues (like true acts of exorcism) I sort of try to remain cautiously sceptic while still exploring the possibility for it to be real on some level. 

 
I wouldn’t trust Scott Peck as far as I could comfortably spit a rat, and Wayne Dyer was a plagiarist.

You need better heroes.

Boru