Not Myself

Last year an exorcist came to give a talk, and this past Monday he came back. This time the event was widely publicized and was held at one of the largest auditoriums we have on campus. And like last year, this event was again short on seats. Probably 5 - 600 people showed up. The priest was asked to talk for 30 minutes and then fielded 90 minutes of questions from the audience.

The priest, Fr. Lampert is from Indiana where he is responsible for his own 1200 family member parish. The role of exorcist is his side job which was appointed to him by the Bishop of his diocese. He is quick to note that he was not asked to take this position, he was basically told to go to Rome and get training. There are 12 officially trained exorcists in the country, up from 1 back in the eighties. When he came on stage the first thing he asked is whether or not he was what we the audience were expecting. That maybe we were thinking he'd be a little old man with a long beard dressed in a black suit and wearing a top hat. Instead he's about as ordinary as you'd expect, middle-aged and balding. But right away his sense of humor and ability to interact with young people is noticeable.

As an exorcist he gets about 5 to 6 calls a week. Mostly from mothers who believe their daughter is possessed. The number of genuine cases is exceptionally low. In order to be called a genuine possession the possessed has to undergo a battery of tests setup by Fr. Lampert, the first being studied by a panel of mental health experts, and other various therapists and doctors. If this panel reports back to him that the person in question has symptoms beyond their explanation then he will meet the person and perform his own tests. There were two that he mentioned to us. The first is just simply looking at the person. In general, truly possessed people will not look him in the eye. And when they do he says he can see the evil. He tried to explain this with old saying that the eyes are the window to a person's soul. He described looking into the eyes of someone truly possessed is like looking directly into the face of evil. It's unmistakable.

The second test he mentioned is that he will hide the Eucharist somewhere on him or in his office. Nearly always, someone truly possessed will completely flip out when they get close to the Eucharist. And he will randomly change the times and locations that he performs the test.

There are a few other signs he looks for as well. The ability to talk in unknown languages is not just Hollywood. Typically the languages are ancient Greek and Latin and Hebrew. Supernatural strength is another sign. The inability to remember what was going on when the evil was manifesting is important. And the last is an inexplicable aversion to the sacred (like the Eucharist test I mentioned). This also includes crosses, holy water, and Churches.

An exorcism is typically a very long process spanning weeks and in a few cases many months. Like the angels, demons too have ranks and the greater the rank the greater the difficulty and time required. A part of the process is to get the demon's name. This is because knowing someone's name has a bit of power. If I say "Hey" you may not turn around. If I say "Hey Gurney", she may still not turn around (because she's like that) but it's going to get her attention nevertheless. One of the freakier cases he mentioned was a story he heard from his mentor when he was training in Italy. His mentor had been doing this for over twenty years. One time he was doing an exorcism that was taking many months and he just could not get the demon to tell its name. So finally he asked "Are you Lucifer?" And the demon responded "I do not go by that name anymore because it was given to me by Him who I hate." Fr. Lampert mentioned this last year as well, but this year I decided to ask if the demon, Satan I guess, gave the new name he goes by. Fr. Lampert said no, his mentor never did get the name, but the exorcism was successful. He also mentioned that we couldn't necessarily trust it anyway. The devil is the prince of lies after all. I've decided to give him the name Norbert.

Another thing Fr. Lampert mentioned, which was last year, was that the demons will curse everyone and know a lot. They will know everything about you, and they will say anything terrible about Jesus the saints or people you know. The reason they do this is because they really are just that hateful and secondly they are trying to distract you and scare you away. If they can scare you away then they can just keep doing whatever it is they are doing. But even though they seem to curse everyone including Jesus he said he has never heard of and has never encountered a demon that said anything even remotely negative about Mary. So last year I asked him why was this the case? Is Jesus just a Momma's boy? And he said "Yes let's go with that. You just do not mess with Jesus' Mommy." One of my friends was a bit disappointed in that answer, he was hoping for something with more theological merit trying to play off Mary as the theotokos but I didn't find much weight with that argument. For me I like the simpler idea that Jesus just doesn't like attacks on His Mom.

One of the craziest things Fr. Lampert witnessed was again when he was mentoring in Italy. It was him and the old priest. He was watching in the background, saying some prayers and the old priest was actually performing the exorcism standing next to a lady who was sitting down in a chair. At one point during the exorcism the lady started levitating and rose about a foot off the ground in that seated position. Fr. Lampert about had a heart attack, he said he would never have believed that possible without witnessing it himself. The old priest didn't even bat an eye. He just put his hand on the woman's shoulder and pushed her back down into the chair all the while continuing on with the prayers.

Because the audience had a much more diverse religious background this time around, Fr. Lampert had several logistical questions brought up that he addressed. For example, the Catholic priests do not have a monopoly on performing exorcisms. Rather we believe we have an exorcism rite which is successful when properly performed. That does not mean other religions cannot perform successful exorcisms or even that they will be somehow less effective (if the demon departs that's pretty effective). Anyone who is legitimately possessed can receive an exorcism from a Catholic priest so long as they are willing to have one performed. And he mentioned that he did one once for a Muslim who came to him. And speaking of which, he also pointed out that demons do not attack only Catholics.

The people generally possessed have little to no faith whatsoever and/or were doing something or were around someone doing something really stupid. Typically things like Ougi boards, tarot cards, witchcraft, animal sacrifices, or other similar activities will promote possessions to take place. This is not always the case, but the majority of the time this is what happens. It's not like you're just walking down the street and all of a sudden a demon hops into you. And possession is not contagious. You don't get possessed if someone who is possessed sneezes on you.

There are other forms of demonic activity. One for example is when demons physically attack people. Unlike possessions which are typically reserved for those with nearly no faith, physical attacks are used on the most devout. The idea is that the physical attacks are used to hopefully prevent the person from carrying out some special duty. Like if Fr. Lampert were physically attacked in the hopes that it would prevent him from performing exorcisms. People who are physically attacked will usually display miraculous wounds like scratches or bruises that appear out of no where. When asked if he has ever actually seen a demon, Fr. Lampert said he has not and that it may be another Hollywood myth. Theologically speaking it would seem unlikely for a human to visibly see a demon or an angel as they are spirits not physically possessing bodies as we do. Not impossible, there are cases of this in the Bible, just very unlikely.