This is an age
in which ideas once completely dismissed by our peers are been dusted off and
reinvigorated. This has a lot to deal
with the fact that certain phenomena remained inexplicable and we still need
words and concepts to handle them.
Yet the word
demon instantly informs. Exorcism
instantly informs. It a victim is
healed, who wishes to debate white and black cats?
The church does
have a chance to make the subject rigorous this time around. That is all to the good.
In the meantime
good information will be assembled and made orderly. We may even get a new name for these so
called demons.
Rise of the
exorcists in Catholic Church
Forty years after The Exorcist scared the wits out
of cinema audiences around the world, the Roman Catholic Church is training up
a new generation of priests to meet a growing demand for exorcisms
4:04PM GMT 04 Jan 2014
Dioceses across Italy, as well as in countries such
as Spain, are increasing the number of priests schooled in administering the
rite of exorcism, fabled to rid people of possession by the Devil.
The rise in demonic cases is a result of more people
dabbling in practices such as black magic, paganism, Satanic rites and Ouija
boards, often exploring the dark arts with the help of information readily
found on the internet, the Church said.
The increase in the number of priests being trained
to tackle the phenomenon is also an effort by the Church to sideline
unauthorised, self-proclaimed exorcists, and its tacit recognition that belief
in Satan, once regarded by Catholic progressives as an embarrassment, is still
very much alive.
The trend comes four decades after the 1973 release
of The Exorcist, the American horror film based on the demonic possession of a
12-year-old girl and attempts to exorcise her by two priests.
The diocese of Milan recently nominated seven new
exorcists, the bishop of Naples appointed three new ones a couple of years ago
and the Catholic Church in Sardinia sent three priests for exorcism training in
Rome, amid concern that the Mediterranean island, particularly its mountainous,
tradition-bound interior, is a hotbed of occultism.
In Spain, Antonio Maria Rouco Varela, the archbishop
of Madrid, chose eight priests to undergo special training in May to confront
what he described as “an unprecedented rise” in cases of “demonic possession”.
The Church in Spain was coming across many cases that “go beyond the competence
of psychologists” and they were occurring with “a striking frequency”, the
archbishop said.
“Diabolical possessions are on the increase as a
result of people subscribing to occultism,” said Fr Francesco Bamonte, the
president of the Italy-based International Association for Exorcists. “The few
exorcists that we have in the dioceses are often not able to handle the
enormous number of requests for help,” he told La Repubblica last month.
The association was founded in 1993 by Fr Gabriele Amorth,
who served as the Vatican’s chief exorcist and claims to have conducted
thousands of exorcisms.
He has written several books on the subject,
including The Last Exorcist — My Fight Against Satan.
A controversial figure, he has claimed that yoga is
“evil” because it leads to a worship of Hinduism and other Eastern religions.
During the papacy of Benedict XVI he said that the
sex abuse scandals which engulfed the Church in the US, Ireland, Australia and
other countries were proof that the Antichrist was waging a war against the
Holy See.
The Church insists that the majority of people who
claim to be possessed by the Devil are suffering from a variety of mental
health issues, from paranoia to depression. Priests generally advise them to
seek medical help.
But in a few cases, it is judged that the person
really has been taken over by evil, and an exorcism is required.
The need for exorcisms is “rare, very rare”, said Fr
Vincenzio Taraborelli, a priest in a church which lies just a few hundred yards
from the Vatican. “In the cases where a mental illness is apparent, we try to
send them to a doctor.”
Don Gianni Sini is a priest in Sardinia, an island
with a reputation for spiritualism — its interior is dotted with mysterious
stone-built structures called nuraghi, which predate Carthaginian and Roman
occupation.
“People come to me thinking that with an exorcism
they can resolve all the problems they have in their lives. A child is doing
badly at school? With an exorcism we can make him study. They see exorcists as
a last resort. Out of 100 people that I receive, there will be one who has need
of me as an exorcist.”
“Demonic” possession manifests itself in people
babbling in languages foreign to them, shaking uncontrollably and vomiting
nails, pieces of metal and shards of glass, according to those who believe in
the phenomenon.
They must undergo the official Catholic rite of
exorcism, which involves a consecrated priest invoking the name of God, as well
as various saints and the Archangel Michael, to cast out their demons. The
growth in the number of priests being trained is “a response to public demand,
but it’s also about quality control”, said John Allen, an expert on the Vatican
from the National Catholic Reporter.
“There are all these guys, some of them priests, who
have set themselves up as exorcists. A lot of it is fairly dodgy theologically
— they are self-appointed exorcists running around purporting to be acting on
behalf of the Church.
“Now there is an attempt to ensure that all this is
done in accordance with the Church’s official teaching. The hierarchy don’t
want it going on outside the official channels.” Monsignor Bruno Forte, a
theologian and the archbishop of Chieti-Vasto, said the Church teaches that
evil exists and that in extreme cases it can take possession of a person.
“God has the power to beat his adversary, but Satan
never ceases to work. There are people who experiment with subjection to the
Devil, even a state of diabolical possession, for which the help of an exorcist
can be necessary,” he told La Repubblica.
“When Christians recite the Our Father prayer, they
ask for delivery from evil. In every diocese the bishop chooses one or two
priests to act as exorcists — they have to be well balanced and discreet.
“The great majority do not have need of an exorcism,
but medical treatment. But with those who are possessed we begin a course of
conversion, help them to return to prayer, to the sacraments, to enable them to
throw off the possession.”
Belief in black magic and Satanism may have been
spread by the internet, but there has been a streak of popular superstition in
the Catholic Church for centuries. “I’m not sure it ever really went away,”
said Mr Allen. “After the Second Vatican Council of the 1960s, there was a
great deal of embarrassment among 'enlightened’ Catholics about exorcisms and
other aspects of the supernatural. It was seen as a medieval anachronism.
“But at the grassroots level there has always been a
very strong streak of popular religion, a fascination with the occult and the
powers of the Devil.
“We know that Pope Francis is a strong believer in
popular religion such as Marian devotion, but that also includes belief in the
Devil.”
In May it was claimed that Pope Francis had
performed an exorcism during a Mass in St Peter’s Square.
Television images show him laying his hands on a
wheelchair-bound man, who appears to go into convulsions with his mouth open
before slumping down into his chair. The encounter was shown by TV2000, a
channel owned by the Italian bishops’ conference, which quoted experts as
saying that there was no doubt the Pope had performed an exorcism.
Fr Federico Lombardi, the Vatican spokesman, later
dismissed the claims, saying Pope Francis “did not intend” to perform an
exorcism — an ambivalently-worded denial that left many convinced that he had
indeed done so.
Pope Francis has not publicly commented on
exorcisms, but many of his sermons and homilies feature references to the
Devil.
During a Mass in November in the Casa Santa Marta,
the Vatican residence where he lives, he said that although “God created man to
be incorruptible”, the Devil entered the world and there are those “who belong
to him”.
At a Mass days before, he talked of the dangers of
worldliness, warning that: “When we think of our enemies, we really think of
the Devil first, because it’s the Devil that harms us. The Devil enjoys the
atmosphere, the lifestyle of worldliness.”
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