Students at a Mississippi high school said a fellow student spoke in tongues and made grave predictions for her classmates for three days.
Some of those predictions included when students would die...
Sparks said Clanton told students about little-known facts in their past and made predictions on how some of them would die.
"It made some students cry and leave school," Sparks said. "Some have not returned yet."
Sparks and his classmates said they think an evil spirit possessed the girl. They were so convinced that Sparks and his friends brought Bibles to school and had a devotional.
"Some believe, some don't." Clanton said. "They say it was the devil, but the devil only tells lies. Everything I said was the truth."
Clanton said she admits she spoke in tongues and made predictions for her classmates. But she said it was God speaking through her, not the devil.
"I didn't cuss anyone out," Clanton said. "If it was a demon, I would have tore that school up. I would have thrown desks and everything. I didn't say no cuss words at all."
I can imagine that such an experience would be, uh, disconcerting.
My first thought while reading this was that she got a hold of the other students' diaries/journals. Then I remembered that our students publish EVERYTHING about their lives on MySpace and Facebook. So gaining access to personal information about another student would probably not require a covert operation that included sneaking into their house and searching for a journal.
ReplyDeleteI hadn't considered that possibility.
ReplyDeleteThe girl is either nasty, or mentally unstable. Either way, the school needs to take action.
ReplyDeleteI have been involved in the charismatic movement (and spoken in an unknown tongue before ). My inclination is Donalbain's but would include the demonic as another option.
ReplyDeleteI think I would go the mentally unstable route, although I will say that some girls get obsessed with occult things. In my day it was "Dark Shadows" now it's "Twilight" and Wiccan stuff. It wouldn't surprise me if she wasn't trying to develop the reputation of being a psychic or something.
ReplyDeleteWell, I live in the real world, so I wouldn't include demons as a possibility.
ReplyDeleteI don't know, Donalbain--it seems you have a few of them yourself :-)
ReplyDeleteI live in the real world and demons are a possibility. Everyone looks at the world with their own set of blinders and/or rose-colored glasses.
ReplyDeleteLike Anna, I have seen the charismatic movement and speaking in tongues. It has been my experience though that most of the time, the speaker does not know what he/she has said. That this young woman does, and the specificity of her comments makes me suspicious of her actions.
*rimshot*
ReplyDeleteNobody speaks in tongues. They gabble. They make nonsense noises.
ReplyDelete*If* someone started to speak a language (tongue) they previously had no knowledge of, that would be pretty strong evidence that something strange is going on. But a hypnotic like state in which the participant does something anyone can do, and which they have been pre-programmed to believe they should do? That is utterly banal and is evidence of nothing other than a mildly skilful preacher.