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To: sphinx

My father knew Fr. Hughes, the local parish priest in Mt. Rainier, who was very young, and had no experience doing exorcisms. Archbishop O’Boyle, also young and naïve, gave him permission to perform an exorcism, which was very imprudent. Hughes is the priest who was gouged in the leg by the boy, using a bed spring. He nearly bled to death, and limped the rest of his life. He described being at the house; dinner was on the table, steaming hot, and before anyone went into the dining room, the table rose in the air and tipped upside down.


33 posted on 10/18/2016 8:42:12 AM PDT by Arthur McGowan (https://youtu.be/IYUYya6bPGw)
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To: Arthur McGowan
Thanks. One of the wonders of FR is that one can post an open-ended question/speculation/quest for information on remarkably arcane subjects, and someone will pop up with something useful. I had read of the stabbing with the bedspring, but I had also read that some disputed the story, or at least the severity of the injury. I'm glad to have your account.

You say that both Fr. Hughes and Archbishop O'Boyle were young and naive. I am perfectly prepared to accept that. But I wonder if the machinery of the Church was seriously engaged. As the protocol on exorcisms works today (in my layman's understanding), medical and psychiatric professionals would first try to account for any non-supernatural explanations. There would be independent checks and balances. As I said before, I wonder what the staff at the GU Hospital had to say (assuming they were asked). And after the kid was taken to St. Louis, the evaluation was repeated there.

There are more loose ends than answers, but your father's account is fascinating.

41 posted on 10/18/2016 9:18:38 AM PDT by sphinx
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