Asian American Spiritual Beliefs Differ from General Population
By Najla Zaidi | 30 Jul, 2025

Asian Americans have a wide range of spiritual beliefs but participate less in organized religions.

Believing in spirits and life after death is a common belief around the world according to recent research by PEW.  Across most countries surveyed, the view that “there is something spiritual beyond the natural world, even if we cannot see it” is far more common than the view that “the natural world is all there is.”

Among Hindus, belief in something spiritual beyond the natural world ranges from 69% in the U.S. to 50% in India.  Among Buddhists, it ranges from as high as 70% in the U.S. to as low as 47% in both South Korea and Thailand, according to the PEW surveys. 

Asian Americans hold a wide range of spiritual beliefs and practices, including Buddhism, Hinduism, Christianity, and various cultural and ancestral traditions.  In addition, a higher proportion of Asian Americans are unaffiliated with any religion (26%, compared with 19% of the general public), in comparison to their white American counterparts.  Caucasian Americans, particularly those who are affiliated with a religion, often display a stronger emphasis on organized religion and traditional Christian beliefs.  

Whereas Asian Americans belief ranges from reincarnation, ancestral spirits to an emphasis on the inner journey for self-knowledge.  In many Asian cultures, including Buddhism, Taoism, Confucianism and Shintoism the belief that spirits can affect the living is deeply ingrained and forms a significant part of their cultural heritage. 

All though history, there have been spine tingling stories of some sort of spirit or entity influencing a human being in one form or another.  Who hasn’t sat around a fire in the dark listening to a spooky story about how something out of the ordinary broke through the material world and either helped or harmed a person in the physical.  Let’s look at what these entities are and how they influence the human beings that encounter them.

Possession is an altered state of consciousness, and the resulting behaviors are caused by the control of a human body by spirits or demons.  The idea of possession by entities exists in many cultures and religions, including Christianity, Haitian Vodou, Islam, and Judaism.

Depending on the context, possession may be considered either voluntary or involuntary and may be thought to have beneficial or detrimental effects on the person.  The experience of spirit possession itself serves as evidence to support the belief in the existence of spirits, deities or demons.  

From the beginning of Christianity, followers have believed that possession stems from the Devil (i.e. Satan) and demons.  In the battle between Satan and Heaven, Satan is said to engage in "spiritual attacks", including demonic possession, against human beings using supernatural powers to harm them physically or psychologically.  For example, The New Testament mentions several episodes in which Jesus drove out demons from afflicted persons.  The Gospel writings state that Mary Magdelene had demons cast out as well.

Catholic exorcists differentiate between “ordinary” Satanic activity or influence which is normal, everyday temptation and "extraordinary" Satanic activity, which can take six different forms, ranging from complete control by Satan or demons to voluntary submission.  Even Protestant King James discussed four methods of demonic torment upon an individual in his book Daemonologie in 1597.  These torments went from haunted places to faerie influences. 

Numerous creatures, such as jinn, shayatin, ʻafarit, are found within Islamic culture.  They are usually blamed for spirit possession.  In fact, soul possession appears in both Islamic theology and wider cultural tradition.  Jinn are alleged to be able to possess the bodies of humans.  However, since jinn are not considered inherently evil, they are distinguished from cultural concepts of possession by devils/demons known as shayatin, who are evil. 

In Jewish folklore, a “dybbuk” is a disembodied spirit that wanders restlessly until it inhabits the body of a living person.  The Baal Shem could expel a harmful dybbuk through exorcism.

In Haitian Vodou and related African diaspora religions, one way to have a spiritual experience is by being possessed by the Loa (or lwa).  According to the tradition, when the Loa descends upon a practitioner, the practitioner's body is used by the Loa.  So, let’s look at what are these entities and why they may be here.

It is a common belief that when we die our spirits leave this plane.  Since energy can’t be created nor destroyed and we are all particles of energy, what we do is change form.  Thus, our spirit moves on, or at least it is supposed to but sometimes it doesn’t.  Some spirits get lost or refuse to cross over.  There are several reasons why a soul may be still earthbound after his or her death.

A soul may not cross over due to an accidental death, or suicide.  In cases of suicide, most souls do move on and only a small percentage don’t, according to author and psychic medium, Kerrie Erwin.  They may not go into the light because of being fearful or religious reasons, believing they are going to be poorly judged and sent to the wrong place.  Souls may not want to leave due to either not knowing they have died or their belief that they need to stay to protect someone.  They also may be attached to a certain place or location, so they refuse to go.  Regardless, they hang around and, in some cases, wreak havoc. 

According to Erwin, there are two types of spirts that remain long after they have passed. Earthbound souls are people who go back to or stay in a familiar place they knew when they were alive, such as their home.  In most cases, they don’t know they are dead and stay on in their safe place.  These are probably the spirits that haunt houses because in their consciousness, they were there first. 

Secondly, are the wandering spirits.  Wandering spirits are earthbound and like to follow people around.  These souls come from accidents or other sudden deaths.  They glob onto not only people but also to psychics because they like the warmth of their living energy. 

Then we have the malevolent spirits or demons.  Sometimes earthbound spirits are not confused but rather are simply bad news and can wreak havoc and chaos in our lives and our place of residence, especially if they are summoned. 

Dark energy can enter when untrained people use Ouija or spirit boards, which can open doors to other dimensions that they were most likely not counting on.  In fact, in May 2021, the Baptist Deliverance Study Group of the Baptist Union of Great Britain, issued a "warning against occult spirituality following the rise in people trying to communicate with the dead".  The commission reported that "becoming involved in activities such as Spiritualism can open up a doorway to great spiritual oppression which requires a Christian rite to set that person free.”  Dark energy is also active at murder sites, jails, or homes that have been involved in a horrendous crime, per Erwin. 

Ghosts are a whole other story.  A residual haunting is when a large burst of energy or heightened emotions either good or bad have been released.  This in turn keeps going on, or repeating itself, like a loop that creates a ghost effect.  These are very common in historical places.  Residual hauntings are the most common type of haunting that mainstream paranormal researchers will recognize and study.  This is not an actual spirit but a record of what has happened in that spot.  The spirit’s influence on a human varies as well.

Spirits can drain a person's energy or introduce negative emotions like fear or anger.  They can cause behavioral shifts like causing a person to act out of character or make unusual decisions.  In some cases, they can cause physical illnesses, accidents, or even alter environments.  Spirits can haunt places, usually homes, hospitals, prisons or mental institutions.  The worst-case scenario is possession, where a spirit can take hold of a person’s mind and body. 

Although It's important to first consider alternative explanations, such as psychological factors, when considering reports of spirit influence, there are just too many incidents to deny their existence.  In all cases, the solution seems to be prayer for protection and deliverance, blessings upon the person’s house and light to drive out the darkness.  Should you ever encounter a spirit, always remember that even a sliver of light will always drive out the darkness.