A family member went to a church that called itself a 'Deliverance Ministry'. Shes someone that will try anything so went along as advised by a friend of hers. She was told to write her prayer request on a sheet of paper along with the amount she was offering.

Whilst waiting o see the pastor she saw women and children coming in and lining up to see the pastor as well. When it was her turn she saw the pastor and happened to mention that since she had been back from Aica on holiday wth her daughter, her daughter has not settled back in and was being naughty and giving a few problems.

Wold you believe that they said that her daughter should come in for an exorcism as she probably had been possessed by a witchcraft spirit. Needless to say that my cousin was horrified by what they were saying.

She then had to go through something similar herself as they said that they will pray for her. She said there were three men in a room and they were trying to lay hands on her screaming and shouting loudly. Because she was so nervous, the pastor cold not concentrate, so she left.

Then before she left she saw a woman with a young child (that could have been described as a low spectrum autistic child) go in. She heard the same screaming and shouting outside the door. She said that that would terrify that child.

Because of all this she told a few other friends about her experience and asked if they new anyone that had had similar. She was told that another church in London did the same thing and were doing it recently. She said that they did these violent frightening exorcisms on children and charge....wait for it £250 a pop! This is unbelievable in this day and age. We have read stuff about this but could not believe that it was actualy going on in the western world....well inside the M25.

Does anyone else have any experiences of churches that do this in London? The one that she went to was in Tottenham and one of the ones she heard of was in Kings Cross.

Please let e hear if anyone else has been through this

Hi Muffin,

Thank you for sharing this bizarre experience. My surprise however is your surprise about this kind of bizarre behaviour. Pseudo-religion encourages murder of those who do not believe and at a lesser level spiritual abuse is widespread. Sadly there are decent, believing and obviously naive people who are ripe for the taking by abusive ministry. Such abuses occur in all denominations and until legislation or some kind of appraisal or regulatory bodybrings some kind of control then it will continue. I am constantly looking for examples of spiritual abuse for the book I am writing so i9f you do come across other experiences do communicate. The best advice to all who come across abuse in their personal lives is to remove self immediately and seek good counsel. Regards CJ

It beggars belief! Do you have many examples of it happening in London?

I have endured and witnessed casting out of evil spirits as a child and I can tell you it is fairly common and widespread in charismatic/pentecostal/evangelical churches all over the country, some to the extent of inducing trance states or treating the 'possessed' violently.

It seems Muffin has got his answer. In my experience though this is still limited, it seems no practise is too bizarre or so incomprehensible as to not happen and perhaps more surprising be so readily accepted. If you have seen the recent documentary on The Plague dealing with Europe around 1384, groups called "Flagellants" went round the country whipping and injuring themselves and exhorting others to do the same on the basis that such behaviour would appease God and stop people dying. Likewise, the Aztecs would some 200 years later offer large numbers of human sacrifices to get their Gods to provide crops, water etc If crops good it worked , if crops failed just a sign that more sacrifices needed.

Very much the same thinking now. If you do whatever bizarre behaviour ministry requires, you will be forgiven, in line with God, doing gods will etc If you remain ill or stressed then it just means you have not done enough penance. This means that devout but perhaps slightly naive people are ripe for the taking or abuse. If only they could see it.

At a much lesser level abusive leaders do the same in controlling their members by saying that they the leaders know Gods will for their congrehant and if life goes smoothly they as leaders are right and if things not so good you just did not conform etc. The spiritually abused person, can never "win", can never sustain an arguement or get any kind of redress.

Solicitors in the Irish Catholic child abuse cases found it almost impossible to get any one to give evidence against the priests who committed these acts on the basis that good old father *** could not possibly be so involved. The same incredulity and disbelief pervades most religious institutuions particularly if you are in the middle of such an order that has told you (brain washed) over many years that their way is the only true way to God and all else is wrong. In Bea's case her situation was even more impossible because parents were involved.

CJ

Quote
bea
I have endured and witnessed casting out of evil spirits as a child and I can tell you it is fairly common and widespread in charismatic/pentecostal/evangelical churches all over the country, some to the extent of inducing trance states or treating the 'possessed' violently.

Hello Bea
Could you ell me more about your experience in confidence. Its funny u should mention your experience because just last week I met a woman from my own church (a lovely congolese lady). She said that before she found our church she was exposed to all the exorcisms. he said that she was told by the pastor that her son had a witchcraft spirit which needed to be exorcised. She was desparate and just walked into our church one day looing for somewhere to pray as all she knew were these types of churches that dealt in exorcisms. She managed to see the pastor and that was 5 years ago and shes sooo happy now. She said that her biggest pain is that she introduced so many of her natives to those types of churches. They are locked in now and too brainwashed to leave.

I know someone thats doing some work on children thats ben exposed to this sort of thing and reading what you said....it would be interesting to have a confidential convo or email exchange with her. Would that be ok? How did you get out?

Hello :)

Is it you who wanted to discuss it over pm or would your friend discuss it with me or both of you? Feel free to pm me any time. But I will explain some of it here also, as much as I feel comfortable explaining. Must just warn anyone who reads this and has been affected by deliverance ministries or exorcism or any similar religious ritual they might find it upsetting to read.

******If you don't want to read content about exorcism/deliverance please stop reading now********

What I remember I think is called "deliverance from evil spirits" rather than exorcism, which involves holy water and can only be carried out by appointed people. Deliverance in the church I belonged to can be performed by any group of Christians usually under the guidance of a so-called "spiritually gifted" person or "spiritual authority" (someone who has the gift of prophecy, can speak in tongues, etc).

If anybody at the church was ill, experiencing stress, behaving badly in some way, rebelling etc, they were seen as having been influenced by evil spirits, which controlled them through various degrees up to full-blown possession. It was said that the devil could have no hold on a person who was "filled with the Holy Spirit", so "Deliverance Ministries" use two methods - trying to drive out the evil spirit and trying to fill a person with the Holy Spirit.

Deliverance was not one specific ritual but a scale of different techniques for different types of "evil". At the lower, most common end, all church meetings were conducted with the aim of getting the Holy Spirit to "fill" the congregation. So that's what I'll start by explaining.

Music would play - guitars and keyboards etc - and we'd sing modern hymns (think U2's "with or without you" but more religious, corny and with less musical talent!). Then at some point the singing would stop but the music continued repeating the same few bars. There would often be lights that flashed or moved in a particular rhythm. At this point usually a church Elder (of which there were a few) would start preaching/praying over the congregation/calling to the Holy Spirit in rhythm to the music with his arms raised poetically saying things like: "We feel your presence here, oh Lord. Fill us with your Holy Spirit...we give ourselves to you! Let us hear only Your Word so that we may cast out all evil and conquer Satan in Jesus' name"...etc. This would be accompanied by erm...what can only be described as orgasmic sounds coming from the congregation ("Oh yes Lord! We love you Father!" and other things that are just too cringe-worthy to write down). Everyone would have their arms in the air and people would speak in tongues. If you haven't heard of tongues it's where the Holy Spirit supposedly speaks through you and makes you talk gibberish (without meaning to offend anyone who practices speaking in tongues...). Often the preacher would have the congregation chanting the same word or phrase over and over.

Basically, whatever the Preacher said, went. If he said God had spoken to him and told him that he wished for everyone to do a forward roll and then try and balance on their head, that's what everyone would do. I remember once a preacher saying that God wanted us to dance in a circle around the church building and that's what everyone did! Also an Elder saying God wanted all the women to come to the front and kneel before him...!? And other bizarre, freaky stuff that is just too weird for me to write here.

Sometimes it would be made known that a particular person was struggling with something, it could be illness, sadness, anger, listening to Rock Music, owning something that was to do with fairies, not conforming to the wishes of the Elders, etc (or something the Elders just decided to make up). This person would be surrounded by people who would all lay their hands on the person. If there were too many people, you would lay your hands on someone laying their hands on the person etc, the idea being that your spiritual energy could pass from you, through the person in front of you and into the person "afflicted by sin/influenced by evil spirits". Then all the chanting, speaking in tongues, orgasmic cries/shouts and preaching from the Elder/s would be directed at the one person. This often had a very strange effect. Most often the person would just fall over. This was supposedly a sign of the Holy Spirit moving through them and filling them.

Often the attention of the worship would turn to someone who reacted in certain ways during the service. For example, someone might start shaking, laughing hysterically, crying, screaming or having some other kind of emotional outburst. Then hands would be laid on the person, and if they were struggling they would be held down whilst the Elders, along to the congregations orgasmic cries, commanded Satan to leave them and the Holy Spirit to fill them. Again, whatever the Elders said, went. If they said the person should be held upside down by the ankles and shook, that's what they'd do. After all this was a "Spiritual Authority" who was hearing the word of God.

I remember a woman becoming hysterical and crying and screaming during a service saying she was frightened of the evil spirits and they were haunting her nightmares etc. Members of the congregation were instructed to pin her to the floor by the ankles and wrists while she struggled. Then as she lay on the floor people laid their hands on her, slapped her in the face, held her head still by pulling her hair, her clothes got ripped, she was knelt on, restrained by the throat, her shoes were taken off, her head was banged on the floor and she was bruised and cut in the struggle. Everyone was chanting and shouting for Satan to leave her. Eventually she became tired and stopped struggling and screaming. Then the Elder declared that she had been successfully delivered from an evil spirit and everyone "rejoiced"!

I remember experiencing many similar things, though the order of events is confused as I was a child. I remember being pinned down and having weird convulsions - which I now think were caused by anxiety/panic attacks - and my Dad (who was an Elder) with his hand on my head telling Satan to leave me. My head was hitting the floor and people were holding my arms and legs so tight they bruised. My clothes were removed.

People were encouraged to hit their children, preferably with a stick. This was said to drive out evil spirits also. I remember if one of the kids in my household had done something wrong and they didn't know who'd done it, we were all repeatedly beaten until the evil spirit of deception left us and one of us owned up or accused another. This often lead to me lying and blaming one of the others, or saying I was to blame when I wasn't. This sort of "discipline" was encouraged in the church.

There were also times when bible stories were acted out, and we were made to participate and instructed on what to do. Some of those were disturbing but I won't mention them here.

There are other things, both involving the church as a large group and as a small group in my Family home. But they are quite disturbing and I feel ashamed to write them here.

How did I get out? Well, luckily, I was shunned when I was about 14ish. I began to have mental health problems and injured myself by cutting and burning my arms and hitting myself and listening to the evil Rock Music. This, of course, was seen as some sort of possession. But whatever methods they tried I could not be "delivered". So my parents became too ashamed to take me to church and I was viewed as a reprobate/backslider who was beyond redemption and would be punished by God. I spent years afterwards believing I was a bad, evil sinner and I would go to hell. I don't believe that any more but I still have mental health problems as a result of my upbringing.

Sorry this has got so long but it's been quite cathartic in some way getting it all out in written words.

If there's anything else you'd like to know or anything I can help with, please pm me and I'll see what I can do.

Hi Bea, I have seen similar but to a lesser extent. It is of course a combination of mass hypnosis or hysteria. Your description is compelling and disturbing. Elsewhere you comment about my insight of disordered personalities. You are correct about my particular interest. I am writing a book about abuse and especially spiritual abuse. The Narcissistic and as you rightlu say anti-social personality disordered really can cause havoc with peoples lives. Have you read a book by Vakinin? also there are further books "More Jesus,Less Religion" and "Twisted Scriptures" that put these irreligious fideists in their proper place. However it wont stop them until there is a proper supervising body and regular checks on the the leaders.
I would like to quote your own experience if you would allow but completely anonymised even to the extent of not referring to this site or your nom de plume. If you are unhappy with this please let me know alternately if you have other experiences as you suggest you do then i would be pleased to consider as well. Perhaps knowing that you are exposing these truly bad practises will offer further catharsis.
Regards again CJ

hello Chris. If it can remain anonymous to the greatest extent possible then I would be glad for you to quote my experiences, if it can expose what really goes on in some evangelical/charismatic/fundamentalist/pentecostal churches then it might serve as a warning to others before they get sucked in. I think there are lots of people out there who will have experienced similar things but aren't aware that there's anything wrong with it. It's only very recently that I realised most Christians don't follow the same practices as the church I grew up in.

A supervising body and checks on the leaders sounds like a brilliant idea. So many bad things that have happened regarding exorcisms and deliverance ministries might have been avoided if there was some sort of supervision. I haven't read any books on personality disorders - all my research was done over the internet. Would you recommend the book by Vakinin? I will look out for the other two books you mention.

As for the other experiences I haven't mentioned, at some point I may be able to write to you about them privately. It is difficult as these are things I've not talked about to anyone. Even the stuff about my Dad I've told the police in great, disturbing detail but the things with the church are sort of final things I need to confront somehow and they are difficult to face and it is difficult not to feel very ashamed also I was very young at the time and the memories aren't in proper order. If you could tell me more (as much as you can if ok, either in a pm or on here?) about what you will be writing about and the aims of your book that might be helpful. and I'll have a go at just writing some things out to myself and see how that feels before i think about whether or not to tell anyone else :-/

I don't think it's fair that children can be indoctrinated into these things from birth with no intervention...if they go to a church school like I did they've no alternative point of view. You can tell a five year old anything and they'll believe it. And it takes a lot to undo that. I don't know if private church schools are still around now but if they are I am suspicious of the whole thing. We are supposed to have free will and decide things for ourselves not threatened into believing. I think children should be educated on all different faiths and be taught to respect individual choice. But I'm starting to go on a bit...sorry!

Thanks for the reply.

I tried to pm you muffin9190 but not sure if it worked...