Almost Agnostic - but one thing still bugs me

I grew up catholic and went to church off and on until my mid twenties. Even from a young age, I've always been skeptical of religion and the bible. Too many contradictions and illogical explanations for almost anything. The "Just have faith" line worked on me for a quite a while, combined with all the fear and guilt that's typical of Catholics.

Now I have absolutely no use for any religion. I "pray" in my own way to what I believe hears me. I basically believe we are all a part of what makes "God". I've evolved from believing this life is a test to believing it's more for the experience. I don't believe there is any true right or wrong either, your view changes with different perspectives, so there can't be in my mind. I don't believe God is a gray haired angry white man eager to punish us for every little thing. I won't even mention my theory that aliens may have played a role as "Gods" long ago. So I'm comfortable with everything, except one thing still bothers me.

There are evil or dark energies in this world. Those who have come across them know what I mean. I don't believe everyone that has claimed to feel a demon or been possessed is crazy or creating it themselves. The best example I can give for this is from the movie "The exorcism of Emily Rose". The ending really shook me because her point of wanting to "document" her terrible experience was to show that if evil of such magnitude can be proven to exist, then in turn it proves God exists. Why does the bible and exorcisms seem to "work"? Would anything work coupled with the right energy?

I've been struggling with this for years and it keeps me one foot in on religion.

Yes, I have thought about the evil part too - however I am not convinced that the Bible and Exorcism work against it - I have not witnessed that per say. I too am agnostic -I am thankful to a creator in my own way for the beautiful and good that has been planted here for us. My idea is that people create their own evil demons and can only get rid of them when and if they desire to do so thru maintaining a good heart and soul.

reply to post by Paschar0


did not see the movie. but as the whole of existence has to be the result/manifestation of a causeless cause that we shall refer to as god; then all is of god, by god and for-----well, who knows.

so if we see or experience and label anything, it is as our mind perceives it. we decide which is evil and which is good. remember all was made by and from god. thats all there is. as genesis points out, nothing was made that was not of god. so if we see evil and not god, it seems to me that our mind is causing/labelling it, strange as it may seem.

and i conclude that "god alone is." or "god all one is". but i confess that it is difficult to fully embrace and live it.

I don't know about evil, but there are bad spirits out there. I've read some interesting theories on possessions and the one that seemed to make the most sense is that it's done by spirits who were once addicted to something in their life and they enter the body of someone who is still living who may have similar addictions or mental issues that they had when they were alive to try and keep experiencing those things.

But nature is about balance and to have that balance you have to have both good and bad.

We've all heard about using the bible, Catholic rituals, the cross, etc being used successfully to exorcise negative spirits. I've never heard of other methods being successful, but I'm sure they're out there.

[edit on 8-7-2010 by Milkyway71933]