My Experience with Light and Dark
It’s not a coincidence that the title of this post is a lot like the title of my nonfiction ebook in progress.
I’ve toggled between light and dark enough, over the course of my life, for it to be a theme for me. And angels and demons are part of that theme.
Largely because I believe that I’ve had experience with both.
I believe, for example, that I’ve felt the influence of my guardian angel on several occasions. And I’m quite sure that I dealt with the demonic directly, and repeatedly, during my time in the occult.
I have tried (on multiple occasions) to write the story of my experience of spiritual light and darkness. But I’ve failed to finish that book.
So I decided to put a condensed version up here on the blog. That may well be the end of that particular story. But my interest in light and dark persists.
An Study in Contrast
I’ve been studying spiritual light and spiritual darkness ever since I came back to the faith. My reference, right now, is Catholic exorcist, Fr. Chad Ripperger’s excellent book Dominion (affiliate link).
In Dominion, Fr. Ripperger breaks down the the teachings of “angel saint” (and flat-out genius) Thomas Aquinas on the topic of angels and demons. And Ripperger does so in a way that sacrifices nothing.
Or that’s my sense of it anyway. I can’t really know for sure because I find the writings of St. Thomas difficult. Dominion on the other hand is perfectly readable. Though this does NOT mean the book is a breeze (or at least it isn’t for me).
For me, reading Dominion is a little like reading a textbook and, as with many textbooks, the only way I can really be sure I’m not missing anything is by taking notes as I go. This way of working through a book is slow going, however, and my wrist has been hurting lately – so I had set Dominion aside.
Then an interesting thing happened.
Talking About Angels
This week, I received a Facebook message from someone I had done a bit of Internet radio with when I was still in the New Age and occult. In the message I found a series of questions about my current beliefs. One in particular stood out.
“Do you still work with the angels?”
So I responded as best I could – basing much of what I said on what I’d learned from Fr. Ripperger’s book.
I should get back to that book, I thought, and maybe I would have. Or maybe not.
Then, as luck or providence would have it, I finished writing out my response and went out for a walk. I was only a few blocks from the house when I noticed a book lying on the pavement in front of me. It was a Chicken Soup for the Soul book.
I’m not really a huge a fan of the series but the title did catch my attention.
“Believe in Angels.”
I already do, I thought, though probably not in the way this particular book suggests.
Later that day I shared a picture of the Chicken Soup angel book with the person who’d sent the questions. She told me that she felt I was meant to read it. But it’s my practice, as of late, to stick with books that are true to the faith.
So I went back to Dominion, sore wrist and all, and began to take notes.
