I remember watching Lucifer and thinking , you know what maybe the devil was not so bad after all.
Think about it ,typical human behavior always has us pointing all our misfortune and bad behavior towards a foreign entity. Each time when you visualize the devil you think horns red face among-st other craftily created shenanigans that were born in the human mind .
Somehow when the name devil is mentioned all reason and rationality flies out of the window and poor Satan is even blamed for Thabo deciding to rob a store .An entire religion is running on the devil machinery .Strictly speaking, if the devil was not living rent free in so many houses of worship for some the purpose of Christianity would fall away.
Imagine the scenes at the after life scenario. All lined up at the pearly gates awaiting entry. Imagine getting there and finding the devil whom you despised all your life without ever meeting him welcoming you to heaven because he has sorted out his beef with God .Imagine it .Just like that . Boom.
Another valid thing we have to think about is if this departure to the happily ever after is voluntary. Do we get to fill out surveys about the activities we would like to partake in in the land that knows no sadness and pain? The idea of the word everlasting is packed with so many possibilities for it to be simplified to people in white gowns blowing trumpets and singing hallelujah to the end of time . The idea of infinity and beyond is too complex for us to be told simply that questioning it equates to blasphemy. Come on. I want to know . Your mom wants to know. Your cat wants to know.
Anyways, onto more serious existential questions. The psychology behind putting the devil stamp on everything comes from our desire to diagnose the root of peoples' behavior when they misbehave or act in a shocking manner so to say.
It is hard for us to believe that our brother is a rapist so what do we do we attribute his beastly tendencies to something we have never seen , some devil .It is hard for us to reconcile the behavior of a monster with someone who is nice to us. We excuse him from accountability because accountability means that we are also confronted with the reality that this person is not who we thought they were.
Lucky for us English gives a name to this consequence evading behavior 'SPIRITUAL BYPASSING'.
Spiritual bypassing does not only stop at us devil stamping everything. It is when we are scared to express our feelings of disappointment and despair and we comfort ourselves with the idea that one day all this pain will end and if we behave well enough we will get to live an everlasting life at the place where the sun will never go down .
I am not saying there is anything wrong with living in hope and comforting ourselves and each other. I am just saying that everything is wrong with being comfortable with being irresponsible and devil stamping. It is weird .It is creepy. It is downright irresponsible even.
Let us say ,hypothetically speaking Mrs Ma'am did not pray her husband's infidelity away and sprinkled water filled with anti cheating particles straight from the holy ghost.Maybe she would be smiling a little more , living her best life with a high self esteem and knowing she was the prize.Maybe if we stopped devil stamping ,the road to accountability would be more clear and boundaries on how to behave when co-existing with other human beings more clearly defined.
In a perfect world we will be bold enough to halt conversations that belittle us and crush the very essence of who we are in the name of trying to not be like the devil.We will live with the confidence of knowing that we are able to think for ourselves . To deconstruct and pick apart systems that try and sort us into types 'perfect son', 'obedient wife' and other gibberish.
in conclusion ,life is too beautiful for you to live it in within boxes defined by human selfishness.