When Science Discovers Demons: The Rise of Secular Exorcism

Mar 24, 2026

Clinicians are encountering seemingly external entities in patients and labeling them 'unattached burdens.' The conversation traces Robert Falconer’s Internal Family Systems–based diagnostics for distinguishing parts from outside forces. They debate therapeutic techniques for separating and sending these presences away. The panel contrasts secular methods with Christian frameworks and warns about spiritual authority and long‑term outcomes.

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INSIGHT

Secular Clinicians Framing Demons As Unattached Burdens

Robert Falconer adapts Internal Family Systems to argue some mind states are external "unattached burdens" not merely parts of self.
He follows William James' radical empiricism: therapist needn't decide metaphysics, just treat whatever the client reports.

ADVICE

Interview The Part To Reveal Purpose

Falconer's first diagnostic test is to interview the troubling part and ask its intention to see if it serves a protective function.
If it names purely destructive aims (e.g., "I want Miller to be unlovable") it's likely an unattached burden rather than an integrated part.

ANECDOTE

How Childhood Abandonment Shaped My Dating Patterns

Michael Miller recounts childhood abandonment shaping dating patterns: he chased availability and rejected genuine affection.
In IFS-style work he interrogated that part and discovered it was reenacting his father's rejection.

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What happens when secular clinicians start doing what Jesus commissioned His disciples to do?

Licensed psychiatrists, psychologists and therapists are encountering something in their patients they can't fully explain: external entities that aren't part of the self, that want to destroy, torment, and deceive. What they're calling "unattached burdens," the body of Christ has been calling demons for two thousand years. Josh is joined by Michael Miller and guest David Fish to dig into Robert Falconer's book The Others Within Us. They discuss what happens when the clinical sciences start bumping into the supernatural.

Robert Falconer is not a Christian and doesn't believe in demons - at least not officially. But in his book The Others Within Us, he documents something that every deliverance minister will recognize: external entities that enter traumatized people and set up shop. They come in through open wounds. They offer false comfort. They isolate. They destroy. And when you try to reason with them, they can't see anything true or good.

He calls them Unattached Burdens. We call them demons. Same thing.

We walk through Falconer's framework step by step, the Internal Family Systems model that underlies it, the diagnostic tests he uses to tell human "parts" from outside entities, and the clinical process he follows to try to remove them. It's genuinely impressive how much he gets right. And it's genuinely concerning because without the authority of Christ, without repentance, without the Holy Spirit, "secular exorcism" may be simply moving entities around more than casting them out.

C.S. Lewis's "chronological snobbery" gets brought up for good reason: the ancient near east understood spiritual warfare better than the modern materialist west ever has. But the secular world is waking up. Insurance companies are covering Reiki. New Age and Wicca are exploding. The spiritual landscape is shifting fast, and the body of Christ needs to recover its authority in this space.

0:00 – Introduction
2:10 – Guest David Fish
9:44 – Robert Falconer's Framework
17:45 – Diagnosing UBs vs. Self
37:42 – How UBs Enter
41:31 – Secular Exorcism Methods
49:32 – Sending UBs Away
1:04:54 – Closing Thoughts

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