Expert Answer Forum
Codependence QUESTION from P. Christy January 15, 2000 Dear Br. JP,
I have a dear friend from high school who has been involved with a woman for almost 7 years now. It seems as if this woman has some kind of power over him, an unnatural or supernatural power, which seems to me to be almost diabolical (at least in my opinion). Many have classified this relationship as one of codependence, and true, there are clearly many signs of this as compared to the textbook picture. But I found myself on the inside of this relationship (momentarily and by accident), and what my eyes saw was something far more serious than coodependence. I was just wondering, how can one determine whether a relationship is merely codependent, or whether there is some kind of spell or withcraft involved. I believe that this man is under the influence of some diabolical power...and so it seems to many of his friends and family. I'm not sure what to do next here...we are all praying very hard for him. I've never seen anything like this before!
Thank you, P. Christy
ANSWER by John-Paul Ignatius, O.L.S.M. on January 20, 2000 Dear Miss Christy:
There is no way for someone to tell unless they are an experienced Deliverance Counselor and even then it is not certain.
There are thousands of variables that could enter in.
Of course, in terms of this Q & A, it is impossible to answer your question. I would have to spend hours with this person in interviews, and even then perhaps only after consultations with psychiatrists and physicians, before a diagnosis would be possible.
What you can do is pray as if.
The as if principle is applied when you don't know for sure about something, so you act as if it might be true.
In other words, pray for the person, just in case, with words like, Father, IF this person in inflicted with demonic attachments, please cast those demons from him.
You may want to look at the collection of Spiritual Warfare prayers located in the Spiritual Warfare Center of this website for a prayer that might apply in this situation. Then pray, Lord, if....
http://www.saint-mike.org/Prayer/Prayer_Forms/SW-Prayers.html
Such prayers can be very useful in helping to clean up things from any demonic involvement or noise, if there was any, that then allows the person to think clearer (without the noise) to deal with whatever their problems are.
And if there were no demonic involvements involved? the prayer never hurts.
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