A recent story out of Spain on how a deranged man attacked monks at a monastery in Valencia, suggests that we may be entering a time of intense spiritual warfare.

The man shouted ‘I am Jesus Christ’ as he entered the Santo Espiritu del Monte monastery and began attacking the monks with a large stick and bottle.

Many of the monks were still in their private rooms and a 76 year-old monk died from head injuries as a result of the attack and seven others were injured, the New York Post reports.

Two monks who were working outside the monastery managed to drive the man away or the consequences would have been more severe. Police later found the attacker, who has a history of psychotic episodes and drug use, Charisma News reports.

While it would be easy to suggest that this deranged individual was suffering mental health issues, there may have been demonic influences at work as well.

In a recent podcast, I spoke about Dr. Richard Gallagher, a certified psychiatrist and psychiatry professor at New York Medical College, who wrote an article for the New Oxford Review in 2008 on a demon possessed women he encountered in his psychiatry practices.

“Possession is only one and not the most common type of demonic attack, Gallagher wrote.“Possession is very rare, though not exceedingly so as many imagine.”

It is easy in our natural world to discount the demonic realm, and this was the point that New York pastor, Mike Signorelli of V1 Church, made in an interview with Charisma News.

“For the last several decades… the devil’s never mentioned, demons are never mentioned,” Signorelli said, while pointing out that throughout His earthly ministry, Jesus often dealt with the demonic.

Surveys have even picked up on our disbelief in the demonic. A poll conducted by Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research in 2023, found that while 80% of Americans believe in God, only 56% believe in Satan. This unbelief in the demonic realm makes a person particularly vulnerable to it.

While stating we shouldn’t go to the extreme of blaming everything on demons, Signorelli added that “we need the wisdom to know when it is.”

Along with this we need to understand the authority and power that we are given as believers and this is not reserved just for full-time ministries, but for every individual who believes in Christ.

“You don’t have to have a seminary degree,” Signorelli said. “you just have to be a son or daughter of the King, The demons are not obeying you; they’re responding to the consequences of the kingdom.”