Free Republic

Like many of Liberia's "self-styled" bishops, Edward Adjei has long believed in the power of divine intervention. He claims in the past to have received direct revelations from God, and at his "Christ Incorporated" church, worshippers flock every Sunday for his "soul winning" sessions.

Don Gabriele Amorth recounts his mentor's advice on how to talk to the Devil. In 2012, the cause of beatification and canonization for Fr. Candido Amantini, a Passionist priest who served as the exorcist for the diocese of Rome for 36 years at the Scala Santa, was taken up in Rome. His most famous disciple (who is considered to be his successor) is 87 year old Don Gabriele Amorth, who wanted to participate in the opening ceremony of the process. The Pauline priest, who recently published the book, The Last Exorcist, wished to remember the Passionist Father and told us about the time when...

The International Association of Exorcists (IAE) now has a legal status. Vatican newspaper L’Osservatore Romano reports that the Congregation for the Clergy approved the association’s statutes and recognized it under Canon Law (Canon 322, paragraph 1) on 13 June 2014. The IAE is now recognised as a private international association of faithful in accordance with Canon 116, paragraph 2 and has all the rights and obligations stated within the Code. The idea of creating an association of exorcists was introduced in Italy by Gabriele Amorth, a priest from the Society of St. Paul, towards the end of the last century....

Despite always believing in the existence of good, evil and God, ex-New York Police Department sergeant Ralph Sarchie didn’t consider himself a particularly religious guy — that is, until he began battling what he says are dangerous, supernatural forces. Sarchie, a self-described demonologist who was once a cop for the 46th police precinct in New York City — and the inspiration for the new Hollywood film “Deliver Us From Evil” — told TheBlaze that he believes possessions and infestations are on the rise. “It’s definitely on the rise. I hate to say it,” Sarchie said in an interview. “As society...

Iraq's 'Exorcist' temple falls into Isis jihadist hands Ancient pre-Christian temple in northern Iraq featured in film The Exorcist at risk of destruction by Isis jihadists An ancient temple made famous in the film The Exorcist has fallen into the hands of the Islamic militants who have taken over northern Iraq, the Telegraph has learnt. The pre-Christian worship complex at Hatra, a vast network of 200-ft high sun-god temples that is a Unesco world heritage site, features in the opening sequence of the 1973 horror classic. But it now lies in the territory claimed by the Islamic State of Iraq...

A nine-year-old boy walked backwards up a wall and ceiling as startled medical staff looked on after his mother claimed he and his two siblings had been possessed by demons, according to official reports. The unlikely-sounding event was detailed in official documents after a child services case worker and a nurse both said they saw the boy 'glide' backwards on the floor, wall and ceiling. Both were shocked to see the boy apparently float after their mother had been subject to months of scepticism when she claimed her home in Gary, Indiana, was haunted and all three of her children...

In the heavily Roman Catholic country of Mexico, exorcisms battle the evil violence of drug cartels, priests say. Also blamed for syndicate savagery is the rising popularity of Santa Muerte, folk saint of narcotics kingpins and some two million Mexican followers. It was the most awful confession Father Ernesto Caro ever heard in 22 long years of serving the church. The sinner was a killer for the Los Zetas cartel, Mexico's most heinous crime syndicate. His specialty was chopping people into pieces, while they were still alive. "He said he smiled while he was doing it. He said he enjoyed...

"...An outstanding feature of the "personality" of the devil is his "abysmal hatred". He "enjoys the evil in whatever form it occurs." In one exorcism, he cried: "Take this heinous book of the Apocalypse. It is written about a woman who gives birth. I always try to eat the children. Do you know how?" Then the devil described with frightening words, the daily mass murder of thousands of unborn children who are killed by abortion in the womb. ..."

Ignore, for a moment, the pea soup. Forget the head swivel, the crucifix, those 75 stone steps that tumble from Prospect to M Street. Forget that demonic voice and what your mother may or may not be doing in Hell. The creator of the scariest movie of all time would like very much if you’d remember that he wrote the Peter Sellers caper “A Shot in the Dark,” that his early collaborator in Hollywood was the comedy director Blake Edwards, that an esteemed book critic once wrote that “Nobody can write funnier lines than William Peter Blatty.” This career in...

Linda Blair’s head-rotating, pea soup-vomiting portrayal of demonic possession is the stuff of movie legend, but the events that form the basis of “The Exorcist” and the book of the same name were actually inspired by a month-long demon-purging over a young boy in 1949. Questions remain surrounding the boy’s true identity. Known by the pseudonym ”Robbie Mannheim,” his real name has never been released to the public and only a few people know of his whereabouts. Last year, university archivist David Waide told KSDK-TV that Robbie is still alive and is believed to be 78 years old. Robbie’s Plight...

“Submit therefore to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you.” - James 4:7 On Wednesday, spurred by advance notice of that night's topic on Think Tank – a weekly vlog hosted by Wilson Orihuela on Vericast – I finally found time to watch The Exorcist, the famous film from 1973. The movie revolves around an irreligious, divorced woman and her daughter, who becomes possessed by a demon. The mother looks to science and medicine, but finds no true answer. Eventually, like the woman in Mark 7:25, the mother “whose little daughter had an unclean spirit” seeks the...

Fr. Gabriele Amorth, chief exorcist of Rome, speaks to CNA on May 22, 2013. Credit: Stephen Driscoll/CNA. Rome, Italy, May 24, 2013 / 03:58 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Rome’s most well known exorcist says Pope Francis performed an exorcism in St. Peter’s Square last Sunday and that the man was possessed because of Mexico’s abortion law. “The Pope, in good faith, got close to him and performed an exorcism on him in the form of a liberation prayer, not like the classical exorcism that one does with a book,” said Father Gabriele Amorth in a May 22 evening interview with...

The video at the bottom of this post is of Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen. It is a fascinating excerpt from a longer video he did, where he analyzes the diabolical (anything of or relating to the Devil), from several different perspectives. In the excerpt I present, he identifies three characteristics of the diabolical by examining the story of the Gerasene demoniac, depicted in the synoptic gospels. Here is the story as Luke presents it:They sailed to the region of the Gerasenes, which is across the lake from Galilee. When Jesus stepped ashore, he was met by a demon-possessed man from...

Press one for demonic possessions, press two for visions of Hell ... Catholic Church sets up exorcist hotline • The hotline has been set up in Milan, Europe's biggest Roman Catholic diocese, to cope with growing demand for exorcisms • People ringing the hotline will be able to schedule a visit from one of a team of 12 on-call priests Help is at hand for Catholics in Milan who need to ward off evil at short notice. The diocese has set up an exorcist hotline to cope with growing demand for assistance in dealing with potential cases of demonic possession....

Does Bobby Jindal’s college experience of witnessing a friend’s “exorcism” doom his chances to become Mitt Romney’s running mate? If he were picked, would it overshadow everything else about him? Robert Mann, a longtime staffer for Louisiana Democrats and now a communications professor at Louisiana State University, wrote a June blog post with the headline “Why Bobby Jindal won’t be Mitt Romney’s running mate, in one word: Exorcism.” Jindal, Mann wrote, “cannot exorcise the fact that he participated in a quirky religious ritual that — if he were on the ticket with Romney — would draw a great deal of...

With exorcism booming in Poland, Roman Catholic priests have joined forces with a publisher to launch what they claim is the world's first monthly magazine focused exclusively on chasing out the devil."The rise in the number or exorcists from four to more than 120 over the course of 15 years in Poland is telling," Father Aleksander Posacki, a professor of philosophy, theology and leading demonologist and exorcist told reporters in Warsaw at the Monday launch of the Egzorcysta monthly. Ironically, he attributed the rise in demonic possessions in what remains one of Europe's most devoutly Catholic nations partly to the...

Speculation that Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal is on Republican Mitt Romney's short list of potential vice presidential candidates is drawing new scrutiny to his decades-old writing about an exorcist-type act he claims to have watched as a college student. Political analysts say Romney, who rarely mentions his own Mormon faith in public, might be hesitant to pick Jindal as a running mate because of worries the Louisiana governor's detailed description of the spiritual experience could drum up uncomfortable religious conversation. Jindal wrote about the "physical dimensions of spiritual warfare" in a 1994 article for New Oxford Review, a Roman Catholic...

William Peter Blatty’s 1971 novel The Exorcist—which went on to become an Oscar-winning movie—depicts an epic battle of good versus evil waged under the auspices of the Catholic Church. Reportedly based on a real exorcism Blatty heard about as an undergraduate on a scholarship at Georgetown University, the novel is steeped in Catholicism. Indeed, the “hero” of The Exorcist is the fictional Father Damien Karras, a Georgetown Jesuit, who, at great personal cost, drives out the demon. Now Blatty, a longtime financial contributor to his alma mater, says that Georgetown is no longer true to the Catholic identity he knew...

The author of best-selling novel “The Exorcist” says he plans to sue alma mater Georgetown University in a Vatican court after the Catholic school invited Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius to speak on campus. The author, William Peter Blatty, says the Jesuit-founded university in Washington has for the past two decades invited speakers who support abortion rights and has refused to comply with orders by the late Pope John Paul II for church-affiliated colleges and universities. The “last straw” was the university allowing students to invite Sebelius to speak May 18, considering she was instrumental in helping President...

Fr. Gabriele Amorth poses next to a statue of the Virgin Mary in his office. Rome, Italy, May 17, 2011 / 03:27 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- The chief exorcist of Rome is seeing a rising number of young people coming under the influence of evil, but he has found in recent years that Blessed John Paul II is a powerful intercessor in the battle for souls.A small, unassuming office in south-west Rome seems a rather ordinary setting in which to play out a grand battle between good and evil. It is here, though, that Father Gabriele Amorth has carried out...