When someone asks me if I believe in the devil I reply, "Only when he is after me."

But let us not use the devil to excuse what we do ourselves. The biggest cop-out in town is often, a la Flip Wilson, "The devil made me do it."

Above all, this belief is most consoling because when we realize that there is an enemy, then we can believe that God is a Father and that the tragedies of this world are not His doing.