Is demon possession a real threat in 2025, or are Christians causing serious harm by calling mental illness 'demonic'?

• LK

  Liam K.3w ago

  I watched my cousin go without proper psychiatric care for almost two years because her church kept telling her family it was a spirit of oppression. She tried to take her life. She's okay now but only because her mom finally defied the elders and took her to a hospital. I will never, ever apologize for saying this does real damage.

  187Reply
• T

  Theo3w ago

  If you believe demon possession is possible and you've never once helped your church set up a policy for how to handle someone in a mental health crisis — who to call, when to call them, how to care for the family — then your theology isn't real to you. It's just a position you hold for debate. Put skin on your beliefs or stop judging people who take the medical side seriously.

  178Reply
• S

  Sam3w ago

  spent 15 years as a psychiatric nurse before retiring. I have seen things in that ward I genuinely cannot explain medically. I'm not saying what they were. I'm saying the secular box isn't always big enough either.

  176Reply
• Y

  Yuki3w ago

  My brother-in-law is a schizophrenic. Watching people in our church family pray for his deliverance from demons instead of supporting his psychiatry appointments is one of the loneliest experiences I've ever had as a Christian. Like we can't hold both. Like medication is faithlessness. It breaks my heart every time.

  168Reply
• OT

  Omar T.3w ago

  Here's the uncomfortable truth nobody wants to say: charismatic and Pentecostal circles are ALSO diagnosing demons in people who are just... socially different. Introverted? Spirit of isolation. Struggling with doubt? Spirit of unbelief. Not fitting the church culture? Spirit of rebellion. It's being used as a control mechanism and it is spiritually abusive.

  161Reply
• F

  Feli3w ago

  I have OCD and have had church leaders try to tell me my intrusive thoughts were demonic. My OCD intrusive thoughts are ego-dystonic — they are the OPPOSITE of what I believe and want. Being told they came from outside me spiritually was actually somewhat reassuring at first, and then destabilizing when prayer and deliverance didn't resolve them. Medication and therapy did. Make of that what you will.

  157Reply
• JK

  Jordan K.3w ago

  The church I grew up in would cast out 'spirits' of things like procrastination and poverty and low self-esteem. If you think that's in the same category as what Jesus was doing in the Gospels, we are reading very different texts.

  151Reply
• C

  Casey3w ago

  The fact that this thread has personal stories from a psychiatric nurse, a missionary, a licensed counselor, a mental illness patient, and someone whose sibling almost died — and people STILL want to make it a pure doctrinal debate about Greek words — is pretty revealing about how we do theology in America.

  145Reply
• A

  Alex3w ago

  I'm a licensed counselor and a charismatic Christian, which gets me funny looks from both groups. My clinical training helps me recognize when something needs medication and therapy. My faith keeps me from assuming the spiritual dimension is irrelevant. These are not opposites. The integration is hard but it's necessary and I genuinely think it leads to better care.

  144Reply
• R

  Riley3w ago

  okay but why does it have to be either/or? Jesus healed bodies AND cast out spirits. Why are we acting like those are mutually exclusive? A good doctor can treat the brain, a good pastor can address spiritual warfare, and they don't have to cancel each other out.

  143Reply
• R

  Riley3w ago

  Luke, who wrote the most of any NT author, was a physician. Did it ever occur to anyone that God might use trained healers as part of how He restores people? Luke didn't quit medicine when he followed Paul.

  138Reply
• L

  Liam3w ago

  ^ This. I left a church in my 20s partly because of this. Every struggle I had was externalized as a demon instead of ever asking me about my childhood, my trauma, my thought patterns. Nothing was ever MY growth to do. Everything was a warfare someone else could fix for me. It's deeply disempowering.

  137Reply
• JS

  Jordan S.3w ago

  I think the more honest question is: why are Western Christians so much more skeptical of this than African, Asian, or Latin American Christians? Is it because we're more enlightened, or because we've just absorbed materialist assumptions that have nothing to do with the Bible? Global Christianity takes the demonic seriously. Maybe we're the outliers.

  134Reply
• LM

  Liam M.3w ago

  Theology untethered from human suffering is philosophy. The incarnation should have settled that. God became flesh. That means the body and its suffering matter as much as the doctrine about them.

  133Reply
• L

  Leo3w ago

  What frustrates me is that this conversation almost never includes people with lived experience of serious mental illness. We're all deciding what THEIR experience means for them, theologically or medically, and they're not at the table. That's a problem.

  128Reply
• RT

  Reese T.3w ago

  The real scandal is that Christians in America get to have this as a comfortable theological debate while people in other parts of the world are dying because of it — whether from deliverance rituals gone violent or from churches that tell HIV-positive people to stop their meds because their sickness is demonic. Stakes aren't theoretical.

  122Reply
• N2

  Nina 213w ago

  Honest question for the skeptics in the thread: if demon possession is just ancient people misunderstanding mental illness, then when Jesus cast out demons, was he lying to the people watching? Or deceived himself? Or playing along with a false worldview to communicate something else? Every option there has serious theological consequences that I don't see you grappling with.

  121Reply
• M9

  Marco 923w ago

  My husband and I serve in a missions context in Southeast Asia. Animist background, ancestor veneration, the works. What we encounter here is qualitatively different from anything I ever saw back home in Texas. I'm not claiming to explain everything but I came back from a purely cessationist position real fast after year one in the field.

  119Reply
• CM

  Casey M.3w ago

  ^ procrastination demon has entered the chat

  119Reply
• N

  Noah3w ago

  Jesus also walked on water and raised the dead and we're not claiming any pastor can do that today on demand. Using 'Jesus did it directly' as an argument against seeking medical care is genuinely dangerous theology. Please think through the implications of what you just said.

  117Reply
• T9

  Theo 923w ago

  Grew up in a church that did deliverance ministry. Participated in it as a teenager. Looking back as an adult with some psychology education I am pretty sure most of what I witnessed was a combination of suggestibility, high emotional arousal, group pressure, and in some cases genuine mental health crises. I don't say that to be cynical. I say it because someone needs to.

  114Reply
• N

  Nina3w ago

  The Gospels draw a clear distinction between healing the sick and casting out demons. They are listed separately. Repeatedly. Matthew 10:8. Mark 1:32-34. If the biblical authors thought they were the same thing, why keep them in two categories? Anyone dismissing possession as just ancient people misunderstanding epilepsy is telling me they trust 21st century assumptions more than Scripture.

  112Reply
• YM

  Yuki M.3w ago

  Great question that theologians have genuinely disagreed on for centuries. The Greek word 'daimonizomai' in the NT doesn't necessarily mean full possession — it can mean under the influence of or afflicted by. The full indwelling vs. external affliction distinction matters a lot here. But most Sunday school classes never get into this.

  109Reply
• K

  Kofi3w ago

  My position: if someone came to me presenting with what might be psychosis or what might be spiritual affliction, the loving response is to get them professional help FIRST and pursue prayer and pastoral care ALONGSIDE that, not instead of it. The risk calculus on delay is enormous. If I'm wrong and it was spiritual, I haven't hurt anyone by also seeing a doctor. If I'm wrong the other way, the cost is catastrophic.

  106Reply
• J

  Jamie3w ago

  That's... not a logical argument. Believing in the resurrection doesn't obligate you to believe every claimed supernatural experience is genuine. The NT itself tells us to 'test the spirits.' Discernment is a biblical concept. You can believe in miracles and ALSO believe that not everything claimed as miraculous actually is.

  104Reply
• I

  Iris3w ago

  Thank you for sharing that. The ego-dystonic nature of OCD is so important and so misunderstood. The church would do so much good if it just learned basic mental health literacy instead of reaching for spiritual explanations first.

  102Reply
• L

  Leo3w ago

  I've done missionary work in places where the church IS the only community resource for people in crisis. No hospital for 6 hours. No therapist in 200 miles. Before you construct a 'see a doctor first' policy, ask yourself what you'd do if that option genuinely doesn't exist. The church in those contexts has to be equipped for everything.

  99Reply
• M

  Morgan3w ago

  respectfully, the cessationist argument is usually about the sign gifts (tongues, prophecy, healing) not about whether demons exist. almost no cessationist denies spiritual warfare. the debate is specifically about whether the formal gift of exorcism is operational. please argue against what people actually believe.

  97Reply
• R

  Reese3w ago

  Can we stop acting like 'psychiatry and prayer' is some radical both-and synthesis? Most thoughtful Christians have believed this for decades. The real argument is whether churches in practice actually refer people to mental health professionals, and the answer in a lot of congregations is no — because there's still a stigma that getting therapy is a lack of faith.

  96Reply
• A

  Alex3w ago

  I'm going to say something controversial: I think cessationist theology, whatever its merits on tongues and prophecy, has left a lot of Western evangelicalism completely unprepared for actual spiritual darkness. People with no category for the demonic besides 'metaphor' are not equipped to disciple someone genuinely under attack. And they know it.

  93Reply
• K

  Kofi3w ago

  If you genuinely believe demon possession is happening in your congregation and your first move is prayer and fasting instead of calling a doctor, you are gambling with someone's life. That's not faith. That's negligence.

  91Reply
• FR

  Feli R.3w ago

  you people really out here acting like the Gerasene demoniac was just having a bipolar episode. The man lived in tombs. He broke chains. He cut himself. Multiple spirits identified themselves by name. If you want to tell me thats ancient misdiagnosis of a mental illness go ahead but you owe me a mechanism for how mental illness makes pigs run off a cliff

  89Reply
• M

  Marco3w ago

  People keep saying 'it could be both' as some kind of peace-treaty answer but that's intellectually lazy. BOTH requires you to have an actual method for distinguishing them and most churches that do exorcism have zero diagnostic criteria. They just decide it's demonic based on vibes and intensity of the behavior.

  88Reply
• FB

  Feli B.3w ago

  I don't think the problem is spiritual explanations per se. The problem is spiritual explanations as a SUBSTITUTE for care rather than a complement to it. Big difference.

  88Reply
• H

  Hana3w ago

  I think there's also something worth noting about the INCENTIVES here. Deliverance ministry creates dependency. People come back. Leaders feel powerful and necessary. I've seen what that dynamic does to a congregation and it's not pretty. I'm not saying every exorcism is a power play but we'd be naive to think that factor never operates.

  86Reply
• R9

  Riley 923w ago

  It's not the default because it requires churches to actually know and trust mental health professionals, which requires them to have overcome their stigma around mental health, which many haven't. This is ultimately a discipleship failure.

  84Reply
• N

  Noah3w ago

  We navigate it the same way humans have always navigated incomplete knowledge: with humility, community, prayer, and ongoing study. The tension isn't a bug. It's where the serious thinking happens.

  83Reply
• J

  Jamie3w ago

  Acts 19:11-12 says God did extraordinary miracles through Paul, including expelling evil spirits. Nowhere does Scripture say 'but that was only for back then.' The cessationist position on demons specifically is actually very strange — most cessationists don't even apply it consistently. They believe demons exist and are active. They just don't believe Christians have authority over them? That's theologically incoherent.

  82Reply
• L

  Liam3w ago

  Can a Christian even BE demon possessed? Because a lot of these cases involve professing believers and I was always taught that the Holy Spirit and a demon cannot inhabit the same person. So either the people getting 'delivered' weren't saved, the doctrine is wrong, or something else is happening. Someone explain this to me.

  78Reply
• TK

  Taylor K.3w ago

  That actually made me laugh out loud but also you're making a serious point. The mission creep in deliverance ministry is real and it trivializes both genuine spiritual warfare AND genuine mental illness simultaneously.

  77Reply
• ZM

  Zara M.3w ago

  That's called the accommodation theory and it actually has a pretty substantial history in Christian theology. The idea is that divine revelation meets people where they are, using the categories they have. It doesn't mean Jesus was lying. It means perfect communication is contextual. You can reject that view but pretending it doesn't exist isn't arguing against it.

  76Reply
• Q

  Quinn3w ago

  Every theological tradition that takes Scripture seriously acknowledges demonic reality. The question of HOW it manifests and what the appropriate response is — that's where the actual diversity is. But if you're calling yourself a Christian and you think Satan and demons are just metaphors for human evil, I don't know what Bible you're reading.

  74Reply
• LR

  Leo R.3w ago

  The DSM doesn't leave room for demons. But the DSM also has a documented history of labeling normal human experience as disorder when it was inconvenient to the culture. I'm not saying psychiatry is bad. I'm saying treating it as the final word on human experience is its own kind of faith.

  73Reply
• M

  Morgan3w ago

  The pigs are actually one of the most theologically interesting parts of that story and almost nobody talks about it seriously. What does it tell us about the nature of possession that the spirits needed a body — any body — to inhabit? That's not random narrative color. That's doing something doctrinally.

  71Reply
• D2

  Drew 213w ago

  That's actually a really coherent ethical framework and I'm kind of surprised it's not the default consensus position in most churches.

  67Reply
• EM

  Elena M.3w ago

  So your answer to abuse of the concept is to throw out the concept entirely? We don't stop believing in prayer because some people use prayer manipulatively. We don't stop believing in church authority because some leaders abuse it.

  66Reply
• L

  Leo3w ago

  I asked my pastor about this once and he got uncomfortable and kind of changed the subject. Which tells me a lot about how ready most churches actually are to deal with this seriously in either direction.

  63Reply
• J2

  Jamie 213w ago

  Saying demonic possession isn't real in 2025 because we have psychiatry is like saying God doesn't answer prayer because we have medicine. The tools humans develop don't shrink the spiritual realm. They just add options.

  59Reply
• KK

  Kofi K.3w ago

  Nope. Hard disagree with the 'it's all demonic' crowd. Full stop.

  58Reply
• Y9

  Yuki 923w ago

  I'm not a Christian but I find this thread fascinating. The tension you're all describing — between a supernatural worldview your text demands and a scientific worldview your culture provides — seems like one of the core unresolved problems of modern faith. Genuinely curious how you navigate it.

  55Reply
• M2

  Maya 213w ago

  lol the same people who say demon possession isnt real today also believe in the resurrection. pick a lane. either the supernatural happens or it doesnt

  47Reply
• F

  Feli3w ago

  Jesus didn't refer anyone to a Roman physician. He healed and delivered directly. I know that's not a popular thing to say in 2025 but it's right there in the text.

  34Reply

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