Results For "Month: February 2008"

There’s a revival of the practice of exorcism in Poland.

One of the recruits is the Rev. Wieslaw Jankowski, a priest with the Institute for Studies on the Family, a counseling center outside Warsaw. He said priests at the institute realized they needed an exorcist on staff after encountering an increase in people plagued by evil.

Typical cases, he said, include people who turn away from the church and embrace New Age therapies, alternative religions or the occult. Internet addicts and yoga devotees are also at risk, he said.

“This is a service which is sorely needed,” said Jankowski, who holds a doctorate in spiritual theology. “The number of people who need help is intensifying right now.”

Jankowski cited the case of a woman who asked for a divorce days after renewing her wedding vows as part of a marriage counseling program. What was suspicious, he said, was how the wife suddenly developed a passionate hatred for her husband.

“According to what I could perceive, the devil was present and acting in an obvious way,” he said. “How else can you explain how a wife, in the space of a couple of weeks, could come to hate her own husband, a man who is a good person?”

I guess gone are the days, by and large, of attributing demon possession only to cases of people with spinning heads who spew pea soup, or at the very least, speak in tongues unknown to the victim new a husky, gravely voice. But there are still cases of Regan-esque possession:

Exorcists said the people they help can be in the grip of evil to varying degrees. Only a small fraction, they said, are completely possessed by demons — which can cause them to display inhuman strength, speak in exotic tongues, recoil in the presence of sacred objects or overpower others with a stench.

In those cases, the exorcists must confront the devil directly, using the power of the church to order it to abandon its host. More often, however, priests perform what some of them refer to as “soft exorcisms,” using prayer to rid people of evil influences that control their lives. (Washington Post)

Prayer is so much less dramatic than burning holy water, though.

What’s troubling about the article is that there is no representation of the opposing viewpoint. Not all Catholics believe that internet addiction can be cured with holy water and prayer. Not all Catholics attribute mental illness to Satan. Not all Poles think that Yoga leads to possession.