The Other McCain

"One should either write ruthlessly what one believes to be the truth, or else shut up." — Arthur Koestler

An Omen of the ‘Mystifying Oracle’?

Posted on | July 12, 2014 | 142 Comments

“One time I was with Cara, Chloe, Anne, and Ellie,
and we were messing around with a Ouija board.”

The blogger at “Please Excuse My Vagina: My life as a teenage feminist” will probably notice the trackback, and to her this should be a warning — as it should be to anyone tempted to try “messing around” with the occult. WARNING: EVIL IS REAL.

Maybe you’re not religious. Maybe you think the Bible is just a lot of superstitious nonsense. Nevertheless, evil is real, and even if you think you’re just “messing around” with it, you are in danger.

Those weird coincidences you keep noticing? They’re not coincidences.

Life has a meaning and purpose. We are not random collections of atoms. Human beings have spirits — souls — and our lives are part of something larger than ourselves. Most people do not notice the evidence of this larger meaning and purpose. They lack a spiritual awareness and do not contemplate the relationship between their own mundane existence and the eternal truth of the cosmos. And so they do not notice that seemingly random events aren’t actually random.

So you were “messing around with a Ouija board”random.

And your first boyfriend was a manipulative jerkrandom.

Then you were riding home from your dance recital and, for no apparent reason, your dad got angry and started shouting at you.

Is all this random? Just a coincidence?

“I’m a self-righteous bitch. I don’t have any religion. . . .
I was raised in a liberal household, being taught
that everyone’s opinion is equal and valid, and
also being taught to value my own opinions.”

OK, I guess, except that if “everyone’s opinion is equal and valid,” you can’t really have any core foundational beliefs, which might be a problem when you start to fear that you’re going insane:

I started out the day so tired I was physically unable to move. My mom had to come in and tell me to get out of bed about five times.
I cried twice in about twenty minutes . . .
When people ask me to do things I find myself saying no more and more often. My friends are getting pissed off at me for being so apathetic. . . .
Thinking of all the things I might do wrong and all the people I might lose. And that was when I realized.
It’s happening again.
In sixth grade, I was depressed or anxious or some combination of both. I was never officially diagnosed, so maybe it was nothing and I was just being crazy. . . .
I imagine funerals. Eulogies I would give. Eulogies people would give me. I imagine people who aren’t even my friends dragging blades over their skin or killing themselves because of careless bitchy little comments I’ve made. I imagine the people I love pushed too far by something I said and sent careening over the edge. Vivid images of me or my family dying in a huge car crash flash behind my eyelids.
It’s happening again and I don’t know how to stop it. . . .
I’ve also somehow developed an intense pathological fear of bugs. . . . I constantly feel things crawling on my skin or fluttering near me but when I look there is, without fail, no creature in sight.

The good news: If you think you’re going crazy, you’re probably not. As long as you have enough self-awareness to recognize these ideas and behaviors as abnormal, you’re not insane . . . yet.

The bad news: If it doesn’t get better, that means it’s getting worse, because the persistence of the symptoms is itself symptomatic.

Anybody can have crazy feelings or spells of depression once in a while. If these things persist, however, the word “chronic” applies, and your morbid obsessions — your irrational death-related ideations — are not encouraging in that regard.

So, let’s get back to the reality of evil and that Ouija board incident. Lots of kids try “messing around” with the occult in this manner, without thinking that they thereby make themselves vulnerable to evil. It’s like the concept of marijuana as a “gateway drug”; you start “messing around” with weed, next thing you try LSD or Ecstasy, then prescription pain-killers or meth, and one day a dopehead friend tells you she’s tried heroin and you think, “Hmmm.”

Same deal with “messing around” with the occult. Sure, a Ouija board is a silly child’s game. But will it stop there? Maybe next you’ll be “messing around” with astrology or tarot cards. You’ll find a friend who shares these interests, and that friend will start telling you about paganism and Wicca and if you keep going in that direction, who knows where you’ll end up? People who say they “don’t have any religion” are often the most vulnerable to the occult, without evidently recognizing that such beliefs are also a religion.

Does it seem to you, however, that there could be a connection between your “messing around” with the occult and your recent emotional disturbances? Because I don’t believe in coincidences, and because evil is real, it strikes me that you may be under the influence of evil — and I mean Evil with a capital “E” — without realizing it.

Well, I ain’t superstitious.
Black cat just crossed my trail . . .
Don’t sweep me with no broom.
I might get put in jail.

— “I Ain’t Superstitious,” Willie Dixon (1961)

Rather than being superstitious, let’s exclude the possibility that the “Mystifying Oracle” of the Ouija board summoned forth the spirits to provide the answer to your inquiry. There were five girls involved in that game — yourself, Cara, Chloe, Anne, and Ellie — and let us suppose that at least one of them deliberately manipulated the result.

Who suggested this game and why? What was their motive? Evil has human agents, after all, and if the Powers of Darkness wished to influence you, wouldn’t your “friends” be an obvious means of exercising such an influence? You see that, even if you don’t attribute any magical power to the Ouija board, it can still be an instrument of evil through which your “friends” act to cause you harm.

“Ellie told me later that they were surprised . . .
that I seemed so casual about it.”

Were they really surprised?

“Especially important is the warning to avoid conversations with the demon. . . . He is a liar. The demon is a liar. He will lie to confuse us. But he will also mix lies with the truth to attack us. The attack is psychological, Damien, and powerful. So don’t listen to him. Remember that — do not listen.”
The Exorcist (1973)

If you’ve never read the book The Exorcist, you might want to do that, because it is actually quite a profound meditation on the nature of evil, and our vulnerability to evil. What we call “mental illness” was understood by the ancients as demonic possession, and I’m not sure that modern science is more accurate than the ancient understanding. Psychiatrists keep telling us it’s all neurochemistry — serotonin and synapses, blah, blah, blah — but is insanity always organic? Do crazy people just have bad brains? Isn’t our belief in the omnipotence of science a sort of religion?

Is it not possible that there are things beyond human explanation? Are we who believe in cosmic truth just stupid and ignorant? And what about your own search for answers?

I’ve been feeling this weird sense of powerlessness lately, like I have no control over anything in my life. . . .
Recently, I’ve been having a lot of mini-existential crises, mostly of the if-we-suffer-so-much-why-do-we-exist variety. I mostly just question myself in circles and end up exhausted by the end of it. . . .
I’m a control freak with no control over anything. . . .
I used to think I had some semblance of control over some of the things that happened to me in my tiny, insignificant life. But apparently that’s not true. Things happen to and around me and I have no control or power over them and that scares me, it really does.
Sometimes when I feel like this I find myself wanting to turn to a higher power, but there’s no higher power that I have the strength to believe in. I find it impossible to believe in a supreme being that allows terrible things to happen to people on a daily basis, that allows human beings to destroy themselves all the time, without so much as a whispered word of assistance.
Sometimes I’ll pray. I don’t know who or what I’m praying to, or if my prayers are heard.

WARNING: Evil is real. If you “don’t know who or what [you’re] praying to,” don’t you think Satan may be listening? Yes, “terrible things happen to people on a daily basis,” but why do think that is? Don’t you think that Evil and Death are partners? And if you surrender to the influence of Evil, what do you think happens next?

Hadn’t you better see if Good and Life are within reach?

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made. In him was life; and the life was the light of men. And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not.”
John 1: 1-5 (KJV)

Darkness still does not comprehend the light.

By the way, Miss Teenage Feminist, isn’t it kind of weird that I found your blog this morning? I’ve been researching radical feminism — a mental illness in its own right — and it is admittedly weird to discover a high school kid writing about “heteronormativity.”

Probably just another random coincidence, eh?

 

Comments

142 Responses to “An Omen of the ‘Mystifying Oracle’?”

  1. Evi L. Bloggerlady
    July 12th, 2014 @ 2:20 pm

    There has been a theme over your last few posts.

    The Exorcist was an excellent book and movie.

  2. AgeOfHorus
    July 12th, 2014 @ 2:47 pm

    Please…it’s the Catholic Church that put forth the idea that the “occult” was evil because they want to be in control. Occult knowledge, and divination put the individual back in the drivers seat. Even our Founding Fathers were occultists through the practice of Freemasonry. The occult offers what Christianity cant, and that’s power, and intellectual freedom.

  3. AgeOfHorus
    July 12th, 2014 @ 2:53 pm

    “Life has a meaning and purpose. We are not random collections of atoms.
    Human beings have spirits — souls — and our lives are part of something
    larger than ourselves. Most people do not notice the evidence of this
    larger meaning and purpose. They lack a spiritual awareness and do not
    contemplate the relationship between their own mundane existence and the
    eternal truth of the cosmos. And so they do not notice that seemingly random events aren’t actually random.”

    I agree with all of this, but occult beliefs do nothing to diminish this fact, and do just about everything to explore it, and experiment with it.

  4. Jeanette Victoria
    July 12th, 2014 @ 3:03 pm

    I spend 30 years involved in the occult, the firs 10 years deeply so with the biggest Occultists in the Western Ceremonial Magick tradition. Let me tell you if they won’t play with a Ouija board then it really is scary dangerous.

  5. Anon Y. Mous
    July 12th, 2014 @ 3:03 pm

    Sure, a Ouija board is a silly child’s game.

    Whew! You had me wondering for a minute where you were going with the Ouija board.

  6. Jeanette Victoria
    July 12th, 2014 @ 3:04 pm

    Dreams on occultism is dangerous stuff take from a person who knows up close and personal it will destroy you.

  7. Jeanette Victoria
    July 12th, 2014 @ 3:06 pm

    And open a bean to an evil you are not equip to deal with

  8. FenelonSpoke
    July 12th, 2014 @ 3:07 pm

    Yes, evil is very real, but i don’t think everyone who messes around with a ouija as a kid of has their palm read is going to go over completely to the dark side. I did those things as a kid raised in a non religious home as did some of my friends who were raised in religious homes. However, because of God’s grace, I became interested in Christianity as a fifteen year old and was baptized in my twenties. Today, I serve in a church. Jesus Christ in my life is the best thing that ever happened to me, although I very much love my family. I know who I am, who I belong to and where I am going.

    However. I think ouija boards and such are dangerous and I would never allow my child to use one. I am reminded of the people who sponsored the Satanic Mass. They claimed not to believe in a devil and thought they were just going to poke the eye of Christians. However, they already belong to the devil who doesn’t care if you belong to him or not.

    Put on the full armor of God!

  9. FenelonSpoke
    July 12th, 2014 @ 3:09 pm

    Meant “who doesn’t care if you “believe” in him or not.

    P.S. Good essay; Thanks.

  10. Daniel O'Brien
    July 12th, 2014 @ 3:10 pm

    Yin/yang, good/evil, black/white, salt/pepper, God/Satan, etc., etc., etc. There are valid, ancient, religious belief systems NOT built on a dichotomy. I won’t bore your readers with details, but for those interested students can explore Advaitism.

  11. Quartermaster
    July 12th, 2014 @ 3:24 pm

    I am convinced that the majority of the mental illness and insanity we see in our culture today is demonic in origin. What we see in the culture is anti-Christ in nature and can only originate with god of this world.

    The Ouija Board is not just a silly child’s game. It is, however, a very easy and entertaining gateway into the world of darkness and evil. Because it is so easy and entertaining, it is very, very dangerous.

  12. Cole
    July 12th, 2014 @ 3:37 pm

    I’ve known plenty of new age, wiccan, crystal-gazing, spell magic with a -k at the end ladies over the years. And every single one has had major problems. Which came first the chicken or the egg? Interesting that society went from saying the devil oppressed them to the patriarchy. Nice little trick.

    Someone should tell that troubled feminist blogger there is a magic spell that can cure her ills: PATER NOSTER, qui es in caelis, sanctificetur nomen tuum. Adveniat regnum tuum. Fiat voluntas tua, sicut in caelo et in terra. Panem nostrum quotidianum da nobis hodie, et dimitte nobis debita nostra sicut et nos dimittimus debitoribus nostris. Et ne nos inducas in tentationem, sed libera nos a malo. Amen.

  13. guinspen
    July 12th, 2014 @ 3:43 pm

    “pleasexcusemyvagina”

    Ah, nope.

  14. Jeanette Victoria
    July 12th, 2014 @ 3:43 pm

    I knew most of the people that popularized paganism in the 70’s most of them have died from awful diseases. The ones who are still alive are quite mentally ill. I only know two are more or less sane and they are conservative (that can’t be surprise can it?)
    Evil can be quite attractive while it destroys

  15. Jeanette Victoria
    July 12th, 2014 @ 3:46 pm

    I agree just look what people watch on TV it is usually about some bizarre supernal story. People are hungry for the spiritual but they get feed evil instead

  16. Mm
    July 12th, 2014 @ 3:50 pm

    Yes, yes, YES.

  17. NeoWayland
    July 12th, 2014 @ 3:56 pm

    Usually what you get out of something is what you bring in to something. Most people do not have the means to move beyond their own shadows.

  18. concern00
    July 12th, 2014 @ 3:58 pm

    …and before you know it you’re fighting with all sorts of sexual deviancy in your life, as you struggle with your personal (and not so personal) demons. Then, rather than continue the fight, you give in and start advocating for your mental illness as normality, because that’s what everybody else is doing and you just want to belong.

  19. Mm
    July 12th, 2014 @ 4:03 pm

    If you mean that the Catholic Church continues to uphold certain ancient Judeo-Christian teachings…. You make it sound like they just made things up with no Biblical foundation.

    Deuteronomy 18:9-14

    When thou art come into the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee, thou shalt not learn to do after the abominations of those nations.

    There shall not be found among you any one that maketh his son or his daughter to pass through the fire, or that useth divination, or an observer of times, or an enchanter, or a witch,

    Or a charmer, or a consulter with familiar spirits, or a wizard, or a necromancer.

    For all that do these things are an abomination unto the LORD: and because of these abominations the LORD thy God doth drive them out from before thee.

    Thou shalt be perfect with the LORD thy God.

    For these nations, which thou shalt possess, hearkened unto observers of times, and unto diviners: but as for thee, the LORD thy God hath not suffered thee so to do.

  20. Mm
    July 12th, 2014 @ 4:05 pm

    I agree. It is egotistical to believe that we, as humans, can outsmart demons who are, after all, fallen angels.

  21. Mm
    July 12th, 2014 @ 4:12 pm

    By the way, John 1: 1-5 is one of my favorite Bible verses, if not my favorite. Stunningly beautiful and full of Christian mystery.

  22. Mm
    July 12th, 2014 @ 4:16 pm

    Another two:
    2 Kings 17:16-18

    16 They disregarded all the commandments of the LORD, their God, and
    made for themselves two molten calves; they also made a sacred pole and
    worshiped all the host of heaven, and served Baal.

    17 They immolated their sons and daughters by fire, practiced
    fortune-telling and divination, and sold themselves into evil doing in
    the LORD’S sight, provoking him

    18 till, in his great anger against Israel, the LORD put them away out of his sight. Only the tribe of Judah was left.

    2 Kings 21:6

    6 He immolated his son by fire. He practiced soothsaying and divination,
    and reintroduced the consulting of ghosts and spirits. He did much evil
    in the LORD’S sight and provoked him to anger.

  23. PJ
    July 12th, 2014 @ 4:30 pm

    are you ACTUALLY kidding me? i was diagnosed with depression. oh shit, is it because i’m an atheist? am i part of the occult? the person who runs that blog is an actual person. you don’t seem to think so. she has feelings. how ungodly. shove your “beliefs” up your ass.

  24. McGehee
    July 12th, 2014 @ 4:32 pm

    Thank you, Captain Howdy.

  25. JackBarnes
    July 12th, 2014 @ 4:42 pm

    so, the occult is cause for dying of an awful disease, or mental illness? that’s idiotic. plenty of devout Christians who die ravaged by cancer, and other diseases.

  26. Jackbarnes
    July 12th, 2014 @ 4:46 pm

    people have always been interested in the paranormal. it’s human. I agree that people are hungry for the spiritual and that liberal secularism does nothing to satiate this hunger. unfortunately Christianity doesn’t offer much either except judgment, fear, and loathing hence people are turning to new age beliefs, a lot of which were around before the Christian church. even Gnosticism offers a hell of a lot more than mainstream fag hating Christianity.

  27. FenelonSpoke
    July 12th, 2014 @ 4:51 pm

    I’m not sure of your point. i assume that you’re sticking up for your friend Everybody has feelings, and of course people can be affected by depression without consorting with the occult or without being being influenced by the devil. I am sorry that she has had feelings of such distress The point is there is another way for her to live her life and she might indeed be filled with greater peace and joy if she embraced Christ and let Christ embrace her. Scripture says that Jesus came that we might have the peace that passes understanding. Does that mean things will always be easy? Not all all. It means that nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord when he give submit ourselves to him and let the holy Spirit fill us.

    Peace be with you and with your friend.

  28. FenelonSpoke
    July 12th, 2014 @ 5:00 pm

    It’s never offered me judgement. fear and loathing nor have I ever offered that to anyone else.. My son’s sponsor for baptism is a gay minister. One of my good friends is one too. I still think everyone should have civil unions and marriage should be between a man and a woman. Unlike the facile judgments of some people that view doesn’t make me a hater.

  29. PJ
    July 12th, 2014 @ 5:13 pm

    thank you, you’re very kind. 🙂

  30. Evi L. Bloggerlady
    July 12th, 2014 @ 5:15 pm

    I like how Norman Maclean is influence by the Book of John with this bit:
    Then in the Arctic half-light of the canyon, all existence fades to a being with my soul and memories and the sounds of the Big Blackfoot River and a four-count rhythm and the hope that a fish will rise. Eventually, all things merge into one, and a river runs through it. The river was cut by the world’s great flood and runs over rocks from the basement of time. On some of those rocks are timeless raindrops. Under the rocks are the words, and some of the words are theirs. I am haunted by waters.

  31. PJ
    July 12th, 2014 @ 5:16 pm

    thank you, republican uneducated catholic scum. i guess i have the devil inside me.

  32. Adjoran
    July 12th, 2014 @ 5:16 pm

    Hey, good thing she was raised by liberal weenies!

    A more conservative Dad might take exception to your detailed dissection of his daughter’s vagina, mental health, and spiritual condition on the innerwebs.

  33. Evi L. Bloggerlady
    July 12th, 2014 @ 5:17 pm

    John 1:1-5: 1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was with God in the beginning. 3 Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. 4 In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. 5 The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome[a] it.

  34. Evi L. Bloggerlady
    July 12th, 2014 @ 5:18 pm

    I hope you get over your depression…and your atheism.

  35. Jeanette Victoria
    July 12th, 2014 @ 5:19 pm

    And in your case it is the cause of crippled reasoning as well.

  36. Evi L. Bloggerlady
    July 12th, 2014 @ 5:20 pm

    Hey, calling McGehee a “Republican” is really a low blow. He is a conservative.

  37. Jeanette Victoria
    July 12th, 2014 @ 5:20 pm

    I find the linear reasoning amusing and telling!

  38. Jeanette Victoria
    July 12th, 2014 @ 5:23 pm

    Spoken like someone who doesn’t know what he is talking about and is just regurgitating silly slogans and sound bites.

  39. Mm
    July 12th, 2014 @ 5:23 pm

    I just re-read this blog post, and I’m scratching my head as to your reaction. It wasn’t mean at all. McCain is the father of six kids, including 4 teenagers. I think he read the girl’s blog post and commented it, in a kind and fatherly way, on his own blog. If someone is going to blog publicly, they need to develop a thick skin and self respect.

    A lot of people suffer from depression. I think that Christianity offers tremendous insight and inspiration to deal with it, and other issues humans deal with in their lives.

  40. Jeanette Victoria
    July 12th, 2014 @ 5:24 pm

    I suggest you go back and reread the old testament.

  41. Bob Belvedere
    July 12th, 2014 @ 5:26 pm

    Evil is, indeed, very real…

    …and so-called conservative David Swindle is playing around with it, as Jeanette and I tried to warn the Fool:

    http://pjmedia.com/lifestyle/2014/05/14/how-10-esoteric-secrets-hidden-in-joss-whedons-best-movie-can-change-your-life/?singlepage=true

  42. Mm
    July 12th, 2014 @ 5:28 pm

    I noticed that. It’s sad, really.

  43. JackBarnes
    July 12th, 2014 @ 5:30 pm

    Like what? otherwise your comment is not only ad hom, but uninformed as well. and you are a homo hater. one of the most awful on all the web. people are leaving the Church because of you and your ilk.

  44. PJ
    July 12th, 2014 @ 5:31 pm

    thank you, but i’m gonna stick to my opinion.

  45. Mm
    July 12th, 2014 @ 5:31 pm

    Yes. A number of commenters on this blog have had first had experience with it, and/or seen its effects on friends and family.

  46. JackBarnes
    July 12th, 2014 @ 5:32 pm

    You seem like a generally decent, and kind person unlike the rest of the hypocrites here who attempt to pass themselves off as part of the righteous flock.

  47. PJ
    July 12th, 2014 @ 5:34 pm

    what i find amusing is that you’re disrespecting young teenage girls over the internet, WHO have their own beliefs. they’re people, too, darling.

  48. Evi L. Bloggerlady
    July 12th, 2014 @ 5:34 pm

    I really do with you well with the depression. I find fishing helps (it might be getting outdoors that does it).

  49. PJ
    July 12th, 2014 @ 5:36 pm

    kind? forcing your christian beliefs on others is not kind…i find it very disrespectful. i don’t need to believe in things that don’t exist to feel better…

  50. Mm
    July 12th, 2014 @ 5:36 pm

    People get sucked into this stuff and think they are enlightened, that it’s somehow new and special. I read a lot of this stuff over 40 years ago. If you study history, every age has its version of new age nonsense.