It simply is not true that only those who believe in demonic phenomena are vulnerable. The opposite is true. It was when I embraced an excluded-middle-storey worlview that a classmate put a curse on me, resulting in a life-threatening illness. This illness and the subsequent healing/deliverance changed my worldview, as well as that of my husband. Nothing else would have done so. A Burmese, animist friend explained to me, after the deliverance, that it was my naivety that made me vulnerable. He told me that the whole tropical medicine class (55 students) knew of the curse except for me and my Norwegian friend; they were laughing at my distress and cluelessness (if that's a word). Now, understanding and identifying problems at an early stage and having a husband who will pray for me makes me much less vulnerable. It has been over 10 years since the last demonic problem.

The reason why it seems that only those who believe in this stuff are vulnerable is that it is only those who believe in it that are willing to talk about it. Others are susceptible but they suffer in silence, fearful, humiliated, and totally alienated from clergy and friends who dismiss the middle storey as superstition. You simply would not believe the numbers of people who come out of the woodwork, wanting to talk of their own suffering, once they have the ear of someone who doesn't write them off as crazy. You (plural) will never hear from these people because they know, before they start, that they will be regarded as unbalanced, gullible, or worse. I myself would never write this stuff either if I had to face any of you in church next Sunday morning. It is only the relative anonymity of the net and my compassion for the afflicted in your congregations that lends the courage to come forth.

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Mary Vanderkooi
Kale Heywott Church (KHC)
Soddo, Ethiopia