Wednesday, August 31, 2005
EXORCISM
In some places the Catholic rite is being put to repeated use:
Mexico City, Aug. 30, 2005 (CNA) - At the recent National Congress of Exorcists held at the headquarters of the Bishops’ Conference of Mexico, organizers revealed that up to five exorcisms per day are taking place in the country.
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In Sarsina, Italy, a priest gives a blessing to pilgrims while placing a collar around their neck. The collar belonged to St. Vicinus who lived 1,700 years ago and who used the collar with an attached stone to focus his prayer time on penitence, the Los Angeles Times reports:
Inside the church, Magnano stands before the coffin bearing an effigy of the saint. Father Gabriele Foschi places the collar on her and says a brief prayer. She is followed by about 30 other worshipers who undergo the same ritual.
"You feel protected from the forces of evil," Magnano, a 40-year-old homemaker, said afterward. "It might only be psychological, but I feel covered. It's one more blessing to have."
In rural, Roman Catholic Italy, many people remain very religious, and very superstitious. The two belief systems coexist, tightly intertwined and surprisingly complementary.
St. Vicinus eventually used the collar to ward off evil, the Times reports.
Eventually he began to use it to ward off evil spirits. St. Vicinus became one of the church's early exorcists, and the fame of the collar and its purported powers have endured. (The one used now is not said to be St. Vicinus' original but is believed to date to the 8th or 9th century, roughly the same time the church was built.)
Tens of thousands of pilgrims come to Sarsina every year in search of a blessing, Father Gabriele said. He repeats the ceremony every few hours, usually on Sundays and sometimes on other days as well. During especially busy periods, such as Lent, he can issue hundreds of blessings a day, he said.
Fr. Gabrielle is also an exorcist:
"I'm not a magician. I'm not a fortune teller. I'm an exorcist — a priest with a special ministry," he said. "I want to give a sense of the reality of faith."
The faithful believe.
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"The Exorcism of Emily Rose"
coming to a theater near you.
What's it about? In an extremely rare decision, the Catholic Church officially recognized the demonic possession of a 19 year-old college freshman. Told in terrifying flashbacks, "The Exorcism of Emily Rose" chronicles the haunting trial of the priest accused of negligence resulting in the death of the young girl believed to be possessed. Inspired by true events, the film stars Laura Linney as the lawyer who takes on the task of defending the priest (Tom Wilkinson) who performed the controversial exorcism.
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Exorcism is associated with the cathedral where The Da Vinci Code is being filmed, and the Catholic sister who is protesting the filming, according to The Australian:
In 1995, Mr Jackson granted me a strange interview. Declaring that he was in "a battle between good and evil", he said a monk whom he greatly respected had said the cathedral was "one of the most evil places he had ever been in"; clerics had begged him to close it for an exorcism.
Mr Knight acknowledges the phenomenon: "Cathedrals are rather like lightning conductors ... they attract all sorts of spiritual forces. They can earth that evil. That has happened throughout the history of this place. But now we're on a roll."
A roll of money, some say. The film company's donation to the restoration fund is reportedly pound stg. 100,000 ($239,000).
Why is Sister Mary intervening? Earlier this year an interdenominational group prayed there for 10 weeks. "I felt something very bad, even preternatural," she said. "Many of us felt nauseous and sick. I think our praying cleansed the cathedral, then this came back."
What exactly does she think is afoot? "Can I be bold? I think it's freemasonry. There are aspects of freemasonry connected with the mystery faiths that The Da Vinci Code is delving into."
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In Manila an exorcism was performed at the opening of the House ethics committee deliberations according to Gulf Times:
LAWMAKERS have joined the clamor for the House of Representatives ethics committee to probe the involvement of some of their colleagues in an exorcism rite at the start of the impeachment hearings against President Arroyo, even as they expressed belief that Fr Robert Reyes should be censured by the church for conducting the ceremony.
Representatives Mauricio Domogan (Lakas, Baguio City) and Douglas Cagas (NPC,Davao del Sur) said the rites implied a cleansing of the house of evil spirits, which is totally absurd.
The report is confirmed by the Manila Standard Today.
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Catholic World News reports that Venezuelan Cardinal Rosalio Castillo has called for an exorcism of President Hugo Chavez.
