In our modern world, the subconscious is often reduced to a psychological artifact, a repository of repressed memories, habits, and impulses. But from a biblical and Catholic standpoint, this internal space is more than just a vault of emotion and instinct. It is a spiritual battleground and a vulnerable domain where real entities, such as demons seek entry and control.
I speak not in theory but from personal experience. As someone who has lived through the horror of possession, I know firsthand what it means to have my subconscious colonized by non-physical forces, in particular, Tantric deities and the so-called yidams (meditational deities) I once invoked in long term retreats. They now exert control over my dreams at night, not as fragments of memory, but with an intention, force, and intelligence all their own.
Trauma, Sin, and the Open Doors
The Catholic tradition is clear: sin creates openings. These are spiritual vulnerabilities through which demonic powers can assert influence. But it’s not always sin, but often wounds and traumas that become entry points. This aligns, ironically, with what Jung called the shadow: the parts of ourselves we deny or fail to integrate.
In occult and tantric frameworks, these shadows are often “worked with” i.e. ritualistically invited, named, and visualized. In my case, the visualizations of the yidam were never just symbolic. They were summonings that invited intelligent spiritual entities through geometric portals into the liminal space of my subconscious mind.
Obviously, tantric rituals are powerful, but the power is not “of God.” The light of Christ later revealed to me that what I had opened myself up to were demonic counterfeits or parasitic forces clothed in deceptive splendor.
The Subconscious
While the Jungian model treats these internal figures such as archetypes, gods, and dreams, as symbolic representations of the psyche, Biblical scripture offers a different view. Ephesians 6:12 tells us that our struggle is “not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world.”
What modern psychology calls “unconscious drives” may, in reality, be demonic actors exploiting our blind spots. They can manifest through thoughts, compulsions, visions, or dreams. They don’t just influence behavior, they shape the architecture of perception, infiltrating belief itself. This is why confession and deliverance are not just spiritual maintenance but are spiritual war strategies.
Dreams: The Nightly Invasion
The yidam I practiced during my retreats appears nightly, manipulating my dreams and injecting disturbing images, physical sensations, and false feelings of failure and yearning. It tries to arouse old loyalties alternating between affects of pseudo kindness and visions of cruel and bitter punishments. These dream invasions foster confusion and despair; and sometimes cause sensations of physical torment.
From a biblical perspective, dreams are a legitimate domain of spiritual communication, but that doesn’t mean all dream figures are from God. In Jeremiah 23, the Lord condemns false prophets who “make my people forget my name by their dreams.” Satan can disguise himself as an angel of light and in my experience, tantric deities do precisely that.
We must recognize the subconscious not as a private fortress, but as a permeable space, one that requires guarding, cleansing, and illumination by Christ alone. Anything else, especially tantric visualization and archetypal meditation, opens up doors we cannot close on our own.
There is no neutral spirituality. Every spiritual practice either opens the soul to grace or to deception. As one who has been inside the snare, I say this without hesitation: tantric deities are demons in disguise, and their preferred hiding place is the very part of us we least understand: the subconscious.
But Jesus Christ, in His mercy, descends even into those hidden caverns, casting out darkness and healing the wounds that made us vulnerable in the first place.
“For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that He might destroy the works of the devil.”
— 1 John 3:8
Tantric Deception 