witchcraft

[The Matt]

Originally Posted by NotforSale

Over 10 years ago, my wife and I went to a Native American village to pastor a church there. We learned a lot of things about their culture and history. One thing that really puzzled me back then was they had discovered that many of the Shamans (Witchdoctors) were schizophrenic. They assumed they had some special connection with spiritual realms that the Tribe needed to understand, but in reality, the Shaman was mentally retarded.

This disease also runs on the wife’s side of my family, and I watched her brother become very ill and die. He would talk to himself, play games all by himself, and claim that God was speaking to him. In the past, he may have been accused of being devil possessed, especially when he was seen walking naked through the middle of town, but the facts are, he was mentally incapacitated from this horrible sickness.

With current Science and Medical technology being so advanced, I believe we need to revisit this area of Religious condemnation, where innocent people have been falsely ridiculed and abused. Some have even been executed under this irrational and irresponsible judgment.

I haven't done much research on the subject, from what I understand, nothing has been technically proven about mental disease...they assume there are chemical imbalances, but haven't been able to SHOW these mental imbalances. It's mostly just theories...from my own experience, you tell the doctor what's wrong with you and they experiment on you with different medicine. Of course if you're oversedated your going to feel as if your mind is better. I'm breaking my own rule by coming too personal on here, but I'm going to share this. In the course of my medical history, I've been diagnosed as obsessive-compulsive, attention deficit disorder, extreme anxiety disorder, and bipolar disorder along with one I won't mention. In the end, I'm being treated for only bipolar disorder, and I really feel like I had a better life before doctors started telling me there's something wrong with my mind. I know this much, I was a lot brighter and had much stronger personal convictions pre treatment. Since I have begun to go back to church, and been prayed on, I feel a lot of symptoms I used to feel slowly dissipating. I can feel my memory starting to come back. I feel stronger, and I ACT stronger.