A Talk with the Exorcist by Gyles
Brandreth of The Sunday Telegraph
On the bumpy flight to Rome I read The Bible all the way. The
passenger on my left - a wiry businesswoman from Wisconsin - found this
disconcerting.
As the turbulence worsened and I moved from Jude to Revelation,
she hissed at me, "Do you have to?"
"It's only background reading," I murmured. She grimaced. "What
for?" I turned to her and whispered: "I'm going to meet the exorcist."
"Oh," she gasped, as the plane lurched and hot coffee spilled over
us.
Father Gabriele Amorth is indeed the exorcist, the most senior and
respected member of his calling.
A priest for 50 years, he is the undisputed leader of the city's
six exorcists (appointed by the cardinal to whom the Pope delegates the office
of Vicar of Rome) and honorary president-for-life of the International
Association of Exorcists.
He is 75, small, spry, humorous, and wonderfully direct. "I speak
with the Devil every day," he says, grinning like a benevolent gargoyle.
"I talk to him in Latin. He answers in Italian. I have been
wrestling with him, day in day out, for 14 years."
On cue (God is not worried by clichés) a shaft of October
sunlight falls across Father Amorth's pale, round face. We are sitting at a
table by the window in a small high-ceilinged meeting room at his Rome
headquarters, the offices of the Society of St Paul.
Father Amorth has come to exorcism late in life, but with
impressive credentials. Born in 1925 in Modena, northern Italy, the son and
grandson of lawyers (his brother is a judge), Gabriele Amorth, in his late
teens, joined the Italian resistance.
Immediately after the war, he became a member of the fledgling
Christian Democratic Party.
Giulo Andreotti was president of the Young Christian Democrats,
Amorth was his deputy. Andreotti went into politics and was seven times prime
minister. Amorth, having studied law at university, went into the Church.
"From the age of 15," he says, "I knew it was my true vocation. My
speciality was the Madonna. For many years I edited the magazine Madre di Deo
(Mother of God). When I hear people say, 'You Catholics honour Mary too much,'
I reply, 'We are never able to honour her enough.'
"I knew nothing of exorcism - I had given it no thought - until
June 6, 1986 when Cardinal Poletti, the then Vicar of Rome, asked to see me.
There was a famous exorcist in Rome then, the only one, Father Candido, but he
was not well, and Cardinal Poletti told me I was to be his assistant.
I learnt everything from Father Candido. He was my great master.
Quickly I realised how much work there was to be done and how few exorcists
there were to do it. From that day, I dropped everything and dedicated myself
entirely to exorcism."
Father Amorth smiles continually as he tells his story. His
enthusiasm for his subject is infectious and engaging. "Jesus performed
exorcisms. He cast out demons. He freed souls from demonic possession and from
Him the Church has received the power and office of exorcism.
A simple exorcism is performed at every baptism, but major
exorcism can be performed only by a priest licensed by the bishop. I have
performed over 50,000 exorcisms.
Sometimes it takes a few minutes, sometimes many hours. It is hard
work multo duro."
How does he recognise someone possessed by evil spirits?
"It is not easy. There are many grades of possession. The Devil
does not like to be seen, so there are people who are possessed who manage to
conceal it.
There are other cases where the person possessed is in acute
physical pain, such agony that they cannot move.
"It is essential not to confuse demonic possession with ordinary
illness. The symptoms of possession often include violent headaches and stomach
cramps, but you must always go to the doctor before you go to the exorcist.
I have people come to me who are not possessed at all. They are
suffering from epilepsy or schizophrenia or other mental problems.
Of the thousands of patients I have seen, only a hundred or so
have been truly possessed."
"How can you tell?"
"By their aversion to the sacrament and all things sacred. If
blessed they become furious. If confronted with the crucifix, they are
subdued."
"But couldn't an hysteric imitate the symptoms?"
"We can sort out the phoney ones. We look into their eyes. As part
of the exorcism, at specific times during the prayers, holding two fingers on
the patient's eyes we raise the eyelids. Almost always, in cases of evil
presence, the eyes look completely white.
Even with the help of both hands, we can barely discern whether
the pupils are towards the top or the bottom of the eye. If the pupils are
looking up, the demons in possession are scorpions.
If looking down, they are serpents." As I report this now, it
sounds absurd. As Father Amorth told it to me, it felt entirely credible. I had
gone to Rome expecting - hoping, even - for a chilling encounter, but instead
of a sinister bug-eyed obsessive lurking in the shadows of a Hammer Horror film
set, here I was sitting in an airy room facing a kindly old man with an uncanny
knack for making the truly bizarre seem wholly rational.
He has God on his side and customers at his door. The demand for
exorcism is growing as never before. Fifteen years ago there were 20
church-appointed exorcists in Italy. Now there are 300.
I ask Father Amorph to describe the ritual of exorcism.
"Ideally, the exorcist needs another priest to help him and a
group nearby who will assist through prayer. The ritual does not specify the
stance of the exorcist. Some stand, some sit. The ritual says only that,
beginning with the words Ecce crucem Domini ('Behold the Cross of the Lord')
the priest should touch the neck of the possessed one with the hem of his stole
and hold his hand on his head.
The demons will want to hide. Our task is to expose them, and then
expel them.
There are many ways to goad them into showing themselves. Although
the ritual does not mention this, experience has taught us that using oil and
holy water and salt can be very effective.
"Demons are wary of talking and must be forced to speak. When
demons are voluntarily chatty it's a trick to distract the exorcist. We must
never ask useless questions out of curiosity. We but must interrogate with
care. We always begin by asking for the demon's name."
"And does he answer?" I ask. Father Amorth nods.
"Yes, through the patient, but in a strange, unnatural voice. If
it is the Devil himself, he says 'I am Satan, or Lucifer, or Beelzebub. We ask
if he is alone or if there are others with him. Usually there are two or five,
20 or 30. We must quantify the number.
We ask when and how they entered that particular body. We find out
whether their presence is due to a spell and the specifics of that spell.
"During the exorcism the evil may emerge in slow stages or with
sudden explosions. He does not want show himself. He will be angry and he is
strong.
During one exorcism I saw a child of 11 held down by four strong
men. The child threw the men aside with ease. I was there when a boy of 10
lifted a huge, heavy table.
"Afterwards I felt the muscles in the boy's arms. He could not
have done it on his own. He had the strength of the Devil inside him.
"No two cases are the same. Some patients have to be tied down on
a bed. They spit. They vomit. At first the demon will try to demoralise the
exorcist, then he will try to terrify him, saying, 'Tonight I'm going to put a
serpent between your sheets. Tomorrow I'm going to eat your heart'."
I lean towards Father Amorth. "And are you sometimes frightened?"
I ask.
He looks incredulous. "Never. I have faith. I laugh at the demon
and say to him, 'I've got the Madonna on my side. I am called Gabriel. Go fight
the Archangel Gabriel if you will.' That usually shuts them up."
Now he leans towards me and taps my hand confidentially. "The
secret is to find your demon's weak spot.
Some demons cannot bear to have the Sign of the Cross traced with
a stole on an aching part of the body; some cannot stand a puff of breath on
the face; others resist with all their strength against blessing with holy
water.
"Relief for the patient is always possible, but to completely rid
a person of his demons can take many exorcisms over many years. For a demon to
leave a body and go back to hell means to die forever and to lose any ability
to molest people in the future.
He expresses his desperation saying: 'I am dying, I am dying. You
are killing me; you have won. All priests are murderers'.
" How do people come to be possessed by demons in the first
place?
"I believe God sometimes singles out certain souls for a special
test of spiritual endurance, but more often people lay themselves open to
possession by dabbling with black magic.
Some are entrapped by a satanic cult. Others are the victims of a
curse."
I interrupt. "You mean like Yasser Arafat saying to Ehud Barak,
'Go to Hell' and meaning it?"
"No." Father Amorth gives me a withering look. "That is merely a
sudden imprecation. It is very difficult to perform a curse. You need to be a
priest of Satan to do it properly.
Of course, just as you can hire a killer if you need one, you can
hire a male witch to utter a curse on your behalf. Most witches are frauds, but
I am afraid some authentic ones do exist." Father Amorth shakes his head and
sighs at the wickedness of the world.
At the outset he has told me he is confident he will have an
answer to all my questions, but he has a difficulty with the next one.
"Why do many more women seem to become possessed than men?"
"Ah, that we do not know. They may be more vulnerable because, as
a rule, more women than men are interested in the occult. Or it may be the
Devil's way of getting at men, just as he got to Adam through Eve.
What we do know is that the problem is getting worse. The Devil is
gaining ground. We are living in an age when faith is diminishing. If you
abandon God, the Devil will take his place.
"All faiths, all cultures, have exorcists, but only Christianity
has the true force to exorcise through Christ's example and authority. We need
many more exorcists, but the bishops won't appoint them.
In many countries - Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Spain there are
no Catholic exorcists. It is a scandal. In England there are more Anglican
exorcists than Catholic ones."
Although the post of exorcist is an official diocesan appointment
(there are about 300 attached to the various bishops throughout Italy) and
Father Amorth is undisputably the best known in his field, there is some
tension between Amorth and the modernising tendencies in the Church hierarchy.
Devil-hunting is not fashionable in senior church circles. The
Catholic establishment is happier talking about "the spirit of evil" than evil
spirits.
The Vatican recently issued a new rite of exorcism which has not
met with Father Amorth's approval.
"They say we cannot perform an exorcism unless we know for certain
that the Evil One is present. That is ridiculous. It is only through exorcism
that the demons reveal themselves.
An unnecessary exorcism never hurt anybody."
What does the Pope make of all this?
"The Holy Father knows that the Devil is still alive and active in
the world. He has performed exorcism. In 1982, he performed a solemn exorcism
on a girl from Spoletto. She screamed and rolled on the floor. Those who saw it
were very frightened. The Pope brought her temporary freedom.
"The other day, on September 6, at his weekly audience at St
Peter's, a young woman from a village near Monza started to shriek as the Pope
was about to bless her.
She shouted obscenities at him in a strange voice. The Pope
blessed her and brought her relief, but the Devil is still in her. She is
exorcised each week in Milan and she is now coming to me once a month.
It may take a long time to help her, but we must try. The work of
the exorcists is to relieve suffering, to free souls from torment, to bring us
closer to God."
Father Amorth has laughed and smiled a good deal during our
three-hour discussion. He has pulled sundry rude faces to indicate his contempt
for the pusillanimous bishops who have a monopoly on exorcism and refuse to
license more practitioners.
In his mouth it does not seem like mumbo-jumbo or hocus-pocus. He
produces detailed case histories. He quotes scriptural chapter and verse to
justify his actions. And he has a large following.
His book, An Exorcist Tells his Story, has been reprinted in Italy
17 times. Given his shining faith and scholarly approach, I hardly dare ask him
whether he has seen the notorious 1973 horror film, The Exorcist.
It turns out to be his favourite film. "Of course, the special
effects are exaggerated. but it is a good film, and substantially exact, based
on a respectable novel which mirrored a true story."
The film is held to be so disturbing it has never been shown
[until recently] on British terrestrial television and until last year could
not even be rented from video shops. None the less, Father Amorth recommends
it.
"People need to know what we do." And what about hallowe'en? The
American tradition has made no inroads in Italy.
"Here it is on Christmas Eve that the Satanists have their orgies.
Nothing happens on October 31. But if English and American children like to
dress up as witches and devils on one night of the year that is not a problem.
If it is just a game, there is no harm in that.''
It is time to go to the chapel where our photographer is waiting.
Father Atnorth, used to the ways of the press, raises an eyebrow at us
indulgently as he realises the photograph is designed to heighten the drama of
his calling.
Pictures taken, he potters off to find me one ot his books. "What
do make of him?'' asks the photographer. "Is he mad?" "I don't think so,'' I
say.
The award-winning Daily and Sunday Telegraph Rome correspondent,
who has acted as interpreter for the interview, and is both a lapsed Catholic
and a hardened hack, is more empathic: "There's not a trace of the charlatan
about him. He is quite sane and utterly convincing."
Father Amorth reappears with his book and smiles. "Remember, when
we jeer at the Devil and tell ourselves that he does not exist, that is when he
is happiest."
This interview first appeared in the 29th October 2000 issue of
The Sunday Telegraph and is reproduced with permission |
