Some Liberians have chosen to fast and pray in the hopes of breaking the “curse” of the deadly Ebola virus in West Africa, egged on by a Christian organization that believes the virus is a devil-spawned disease, a form of God’s punishment for immoral acts.

“Ebola is a virus from the devil,” Reverend G. Benitoe, a representative at the National Christian Ebola Task Force, said at a news conference, according to FOX News. “We have traded the worship of God with the worship of demons and witchcraft, and evil stuff is now happening in this country.” The National Christian Ebola Task Force is an organization that includes several different Christian denominations and was created in September during the epidemic.

The Ebola outbreak has raged on for several months in the countries of Sierra Leone, Liberia, Nigeria, and Guinea — though Nigeria is now Ebola-free as of Oct. 20, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). Fear and lack of accurate information about the virus in these countries has led to its rampant spread. Many people who still follow traditional burial methods, or who believe Ebola is an act of punishment from God — or is caused by the devil — are often unaware of the facts: how the disease spreads, its likely origin in bushmeat, and the proper treatment and prevention protocols for it.

About 85 percent of Liberia’s 4 million people practice Christianity, and about 12 percent are Muslims. While praying may help some people retain strength and hope during the outbreak, it’s important to not get religion mixed up with the misinformation that’s out there about the disease.

“Some of [the people] are in denial and that it is something they can treat at home, and faith healers are one of the problems for us,” A doctor in Sierra Leone told The Guardian earlier this summer. “When you have patients disappearing like that, you don’t know where the virus will appear next.” The doctor also noted that families of Ebola patients have attempted to break them out of treatment facilities, due to the belief that Ebola isn’t real or is a lie — or that they can care for their loved ones at home and abide by traditional healing methods. When the bodies of Ebola victims are taken away by health workers — an extremely important tactic, due to the fact that dead bodies are the most dangerous and infectious, essentially oozing out the virus — villagers have attacked health workers, even killing them in some instances, to retrieve the bodies of their loved ones for a traditional burial.

Some Liberians believe that praying and fasting will assist in slowing the epidemic. “I have faith that after Friday things will not be the same in Liberia with Ebola,” Mary Freeman, a member of the Faith Healing Temple of Jesus Christ of Monrovia, told FOX News. “The Lord has taken pre-eminence over our situation.”

Indeed, the WHO recently announced that the epidemic might be slowing down in Liberia. But it's too soon to tell whether or not the worst is over.

According to Liberia’s deputy chief medical officer, Tolbert Nyenswah, the Liberian health ministry has attempted to combat the lack of education and stubbornness to cling to religious or spiritual beliefs by putting out disturbing images of Ebola patients on TV and newspapers. “They are very graphic but it is working — people are starting to see that Ebola is not just a spiritual thing that you can cure through going to church,” Nyenswah said.