First Poland releases the first Exorcism Magazine, Egzorcysta, as reported in these pages by Javier.
Now the Catholic Church has opened its phones to an Exorcism Hotline.

Dial 666?

From Spirit Rescue International

Friday, November 30, 2012
Catholic Church Establishes Exorcism Hotline

The Catholic Church has established an exorcist hotline in Milan, its biggest diocese, to cope with demand. Monsignor Angelo Mascheroni, the diocese’s chief exorcist since 1995, said the curia had also appointed twice as many exorcists to cope with a doubling in the number of requests for help over 15 years.

“We get many requests for names, addresses and phone numbers; that’s why we’ve set up a switchboard in the curia from Monday to Friday from 2.30pm to 5pm,” he told the chiesadimilano website.

“People in need can call and will be able to find a priest in the same area who doesn’t have to travel too far.” And to that end, the number of demon-busting priests on call has increased from six to 12.

The Monsignor said he knew of one exorcist who had been seeing up to 120 people a day. “But with so little time per client he was only able to offer a quick blessing. That’s not enough,” he said. ”There should be two to four appointments a day, no more, otherwise it’s too much.”

It’s not clear why the number of suspected possessions has risen so sharply. But Monsignor Mascheroni said that part of the increase might be explained by the rising numbers of parents having difficulty controlling disobedient teenagers.

“Usually the parents call [because they are] concerned about a child who won’t go to school or who’s taking drugs or rebelling. In reality it’s not a demon, but when they’re 18 years old young people don’t want to be told what to do.”

He warned that many worried and vulnerable people were at risk from charlatans. “Magicians demand money; we … give our time, give benediction … all for free. It couldn’t be any other way.”

The Monsignor said that all those who sought help were welcomed. But he added: “The real diabolical phenomena, at least in my experience, are very rare.” He said that “mental phenomena, mental and psychiatric disorders” were often to blame for unusual behaviour.

Not all Catholic exorcists take such a pragmatic approach, however. Father Gabriele Amorth, who was the Vatican’s chief exorcist for 25 years, claims to have dealt with 70,000 cases of demonic possession.

Father Amorth said that sex abuse scandals in the Roman Catholic Church were proof that “the Devil is at work inside the Vatican”. He also claimed that satanic behaviour lay behind Vatican attempts to “cover up” the deaths of Alois Estermann, then commander of the Swiss Guard, his wife and another Swiss Guard, Corporal Cedric Tornay, in 1998.

Father Amorth also took a dim view of fantasy novels and yoga. Practising the latter, he once warned, was “satanic; it leads to evil just like reading Harry Potter”.

The act of exorcism: Catholic practice

Defined by the Catholic Encyclopaedia as “the act of driving out, or warding off, demons, or evil spirits, from persons, places, or things which are believed to be possessed or infested by them, or are liable to become victims or instruments of their malice,” exorcism has been practised by the Church for centuries, but its use has increased dramatically over the last half century. – Independent

Where does the practice of Exorcism come from?

The origins of exorcism can be found in the effects of Zoroastrian and ancient Near Eastern beliefs on early Judaism and Christianity. Zoroastrianism’s dualistic beliefs and apocalypticism is a nurturing ground for ideas of exorcisms and possession. “The spirit of Ahura Mazda is said to be with the one who chooses good [Yasna 33.14], and one can assume the same of the evil spirit for those who chose evil. Mary Boyce underscores the importance of possession in Zoroastrian doctrine: ‘The concepts of divinity and of humanly possessed power seem frequently to blend, through the thought of that power proceeding from the divinity, who has himself actually entered into the person.”

At a time when the population of the world was largely uneducated, the church was a source of education. Much of what we know of science and medicine came out of work being done by monks and religious men and women as these were some of the few people who actually had enough education to wonder and think critically about the world we live in. It is a shame that an organization as broadly based as the Catholic Church cannot continue that tradition, as in modern times it seems that as the world gets educated (the current state of the American education system not withstanding) the church seems to espouse just the opposite view, that returning to medieval ignorance is the right thing to do. At the very least I hope, and they certainly should make certain that anyone seeking exorcism first pursue every avenue of medical and psychological evaluation before allowing anyone to undergo religious ceremonies as a means of healing.

Support of the church in pursuing this superstitious ritual at best supports the rare case of psycho-somatic healing, generally may be considered to have no effect one way or the other, but in too many cases has disastrous effects on the victim, that being the one who is mistreated in these cases.

Notable cases that led to disaster According to Mikipedia:

An October 2007 mākutu lifting in the Wellington, New Zealand suburb of Wainuiomata led to the death by drowning of a woman and the hospitalization of a teen. After a long trial, five family members were convicted and sentenced to non-custodial sentences.

Anneliese Michel was a Catholic woman from Germany who was said to be possessed by six or more demons and subsequently underwent a secret ten-month-long voluntary exorcism in 1975. Two motion pictures, The Exorcism of Emily Rose and Requiem are loosely based on Anneliese’s story. The documentary movie Exorcism of Anneliese Michel (in Polish, with English subtitles) features the original audio tapes from the exorcism. The two priests and her parents were convicted of negligent manslaughter for failing to call a medical doctor to address her eating disorder. When she died she weighed 68 pounds. The case has been labelled a misidentification of mental illness, negligence, abuse, and religious hysteria.

But then I have read every Harry Potter novel, more than once, and seen the movies so I got devils runnin’ all through me.

[email protected]

Fun Facts:
Dialing 911 was first established in Alaska and Alabama in 1968. I am unsure how long after that someone first said “Dial 911, make a cop come.”

I wonder what the joke will be for the Exorcist Hotline?