The Devil Made Me Do It

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In the 1970s, a comedian named Flip Wilson turned the phrase, “The devil made me do it,” into a national buzz phrase. It seemed funny at the time because “Geraldine,” one of his funniest characters, used it interminably to excuse her bad behavior.

But does the devil exist, and should people searching for God worry about him/her?  

My short answers are, “I don’t know,” and “No.”

Back when Wilson coined the buzz phrase, a hefty majority of Americans believed in the devil. Even in 2001, according to a Gallup Poll, 68 percent said they held such a belief. The most recent poll data I could find is from a 2016 Gallup poll in which that percentage was 61.  

An Article of Faith?

From the Catholic perspective - one that I believe is shared by the mainline Protestant denominations - belief in the devil, or Satan, is not among the “12 articles of faith” that are part of the Apostles’ Creed. That creed does say Jesus “descended into hell,” but Catholicsay.com. says that doesn’t refer to the “hell’ where people are punished but “the place for the dead as the Jews and Early Christians then called it.”

And belief in the devil is not among “the top five beliefs of the Catholic Church,” as described in another article in a website for “all things Catholic.”

The index of the Catholic catechism has 12 references to Satan but none, as far as I can tell, pose Satan’s existence as a matter of faith. Instead, the catechism seems to presume Satan’s existence.

Flip Wilson
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The Catholic Church has exorcists, of course, and their use seems to be as popular now as a decade ago. “Exorcist” was among the Catholic Church’s “minor orders,” church positions that date at least from the early Middle Ages. They were conferred on seminarians after reception of the clerical tonsure but several years before ordination as priests. I received the minor orders, in fact, including that of exorcist, but I recall their significance being glossed over in seminary classes – over 50 years ago!

In a 2014 article, John Switzer, associate professor of theology at Spring Hill College, a Jesuit institution in Mobile, Alabama, had this to say on the subject of belief in Satan.

“The authors of Genesis seem to have had no problem describing the first sin without blaming it on the devil. There is no indication in the story that the serpent was anything more to them than a talking snake.

“Satan as a character doesn’t appear in the Bible until the Book of Job,” he writes, “where he is portrayed as a servant rather than enemy of God. By Jesus’ time the devil had become the explanation for all that goes wrong in the world.

“…The question remains whether we are best served by the idea that the inspiration for evil belongs with a mythical creature who roams the world infecting Christians with sinful desires. Evil is most powerful when we fail to recognize its source: the broken human tendency toward selfishness and apathy.”

Jesus Refers to Satan

In the gospels, Jesus often refers to Satan. In Luke’s gospel, for instance, after the 70 disciples returned from their first missionary journey, he told them, “I have observed Satan fall like lightning from the sky.”

Was he speaking literally or figuratively? He was probably using a figure of speech, not saying he actually saw such a scene.

So back to my questions above. Does Satan exist as a spiritual being? I don’t know. Do people searching for God need to worry about him/her? I don’t.

I don’t deny the existence of evil in the world and see the devil as its probable mythical personification. In any case, I focus on my relationship to God, my loving Father, and take full responsibility for my actions – good and bad.