Word: devilment
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...Christian centuries that followed were more plainspoken. Tertullian reflected the mind of many early church fathers when he pronounced, in the 3rd century, that women were "the devil's gateway...
Williams has said, "I was brought up puritanically. I try to outrage that Puritanism." As a dramatist, he sometimes practices a reverse puritanism by preaching salvation through the big stud. This holy devil can redeem parched, inhibited and neurotic women, but those who do not avail themselves of his service, like shy, strait-laced Alma Winemiller in Summer and Smoke, seal their doom...
Christians are learning to fear Satan again. A group called Morris Cerullo World Evangelism Inc. in San Diego claims that at least 10 million Americans dabble in the occult arts traditionally associated with the devil -witchcraft, Black Masses, even blood-drinking orgies. The organization has dispatched an anti-occult mobile unit to tour 45 cities in an effort to turn people away from diabolism. And in Rome late last month, theologians and students at the Pontifical Gregorian University held a "Devil Day" seminar to examine the Roman Catholic Church's current teaching on Satan and other diabolical spirits...
...panelists did not evoke the medieval image of a devil with horns, forked tail and cloven hoofs. But they did uphold the orthodox Christian view that devils are personal evil spirits, angels who fell from God's grace by their own exercise of free will. God permits their evildoing among men because it is part of the natural disorder of things, a necessary consequence of their original rebellion against God. Though the panelists agreed that the existence of personal devils is a firm part of Catholic dogma, a number of other Catholics believe that Satan and his demons...
...resurgence of interest in devils at all? Canadian Theologian Kenneth Hamilton blames demythologized religion. "Liberal Protestantism excluded anything that couldn't be explained. But you can't have religious faith without the existence of a world transcending this one. People are starved of anything transcendent, and they have gone to the oldest and crudest superstitions." Evangelist Billy Graham says that Satanism is on the rise because belief in Jesus is growing. "The devil," asserts Graham, "is also making his pitch...