My spiritual journey has always been a personal one. I don’t like anyone telling me what to believe. But no matter how far I stray, I can’t quite escape the roots of my early indoctrination.

I was raised in the church. Not just any church — a mega church. Carpenter’s Home Church in Lakeland, Florida, to be exact. It was the Pentecostal capital of Central Florida, complete with a private school — Evangel Christian — which I attended from kindergarten through middle school.

As a kid, watching people be “slain in the spirit,” laugh uncontrollably, speak in tongues, or shake violently during prayer wasn’t out of the ordinary — it was a weekly occurrence. It was as much a part of my life as Southern fried food. I grew up in a belief system rooted in the idea of spiritual warfare: an eternal battle between demons and angels raging in a parallel realm just beyond our perception.

I was eight years old hearing testimonials from grown adults who claimed to have seen demons. Like the guy who looked in his rearview mirror late one night and saw a demon sitting in the backseat, with the fires of hell burning behind it. These stories were treated as truth. Not metaphor. Not parable. Truth.

But then I grew up. Discovered the internet. Left for college. All of it led to a slow but steady unraveling of my belief system. It wasn’t just education or science that pushed me away. It was the hypocrisy. The judgment. I rejected Christianity not because I stopped believing in something, but because I couldn’t stomach the way faith was being weaponized.

For a while, I dabbled in atheism. But that didn’t fit either. Eventually, I settled into the gray area of agnosticism. Because when you grow up in an environment like I did, you experience things that science doesn’t quite explain. Things that make you wonder.

As I got older, I leaned deeper into science — quantum physics, dark matter, multiple dimensions, energy, the limits of human perception. And through that pursuit, I came to understand just how little we truly know. Our five senses are limited. We know there are entire spectrums beyond our ability to see, hear, or detect without tools — infrared, ultraviolet, ultrasonic, and beyond. If these things exist just outside our perception and are proven real, what else might exist that we don’t have the tools to measure?

This is part of why I walked away from atheism. Atheism, to me, assumes we know everything worth knowing — that nothing exists beyond our current understanding. It places total confidence in human intelligence. And frankly, I don’t. That kind of certainty feels just as blind as faith.

The only thing I truly know is that I don’t know much. So how can I rule out demons?

Recently, I started watching The Perfect Neighbor on Netflix — a documentary about Susan Lorincz. And within minutes of watching her, I got this overwhelming sense that I was looking at something… not entirely human. Something that had given itself over to a darkness. A parasite. A presence. A demon.

Granted, I was a little high — but that only sharpened the feeling.

For context, Lorincz was a white woman who moved into a predominantly Black neighborhood in Florida. Over time, she harassed her neighbors — especially the kids — with racist and hateful comments. One night, her neighbor, a mother of four, tried to confront her after yet another incident. Lorincz shot and killed her. No remorse. No regret. Just this blank stare and smug self-righteousness.

I don’t think it was an accident. I think she wanted to kill her. And I think she was satisfied afterward.

When I say “demon,” I don’t mean a little red imp with horns. I’m not talking about Hollywood mythology. I’m talking about the invisible spark that lights the fire of hatred, paranoia, and destruction. You could call it mental illness, and you wouldn’t be wrong — but I also think that many things we now call “mental illness” were once labeled “possession.” I’m not saying the two are synonymous, but they overlap in eerie ways.

Demons — as I’m beginning to define them — feed off fear. Fear is their lifeblood. It’s the seed of hatred, paranoia, delusion, and violence. The more fear we allow into our hearts and minds, the more power these “entities” — call them what you want — seem to have.

And I suspect demons thrive under certain conditions. Isolation. Loneliness. Despair. Fear. These are the perfect soil for darkness to grow. I don’t know Susan Lorincz’s personal history, but I’d wager she doesn’t have many close relationships. Maybe no kids. Maybe a trail of estranged family members. Probably spends too much time online or alone. Probably afraid of a lot of things that don’t warrant fear.

When someone lives in that state — disconnected from love, community, and self-awareness — the door opens. Darkness creeps in. Whether we call it a demon, delusion, or disorder, the result is the same: something takes over. And eventually, that something may lash out — destroying themselves or others.

Of course, people like this need help. Therapy. Connection. Healing. But not everyone seeks that. And not everyone can be saved.

So… do demons exist?

Maybe not in the way I was taught. But maybe in the way I feel — as infections of the soul. Maybe they exist in the spaces we’ve neglected — the minds we’ve ignored, the communities we’ve abandoned, the hearts left unchecked.

Maybe demons are just the name Christianity gave to darkness.