We don’t watch a lot of TV. But every evening, we settle in and stream our favorite shows for a couple of hours. The lineup has been diverse over the years.
But recently, I convinced Mary to watch EVIL on Paramount Plus. I’ve seen them all to date. But I think it is an inventive, funny, scary, well-written show. Mostly, I love the characters. And to me, the characters are 90% of any show.
Recently, I saw an interview with one of the actors, Mike Colter, who plays David Acosta, a soon-to-be priest. During the interview, Colter said he worked with a real Catholic priest whose only job was to perform exorcisms. Yes. All the time.
Anyway, the very next day I came across an article in one of my news feeds about a real-life Catholic priest who does just that. Performs exorcisms.
The priest is Father Gabriele Amorth. He claims that he performed more than 100,000 exorcisms between 1986 and 2016. But he also noted that only 100 of them were true cases of demonic possession.
He also said that he did not fear the Devil. The Devil feared him. That’s ballsy if you ask me.
Anyway. This is a real “position” in the Catholic Church. There is one guy that heads up the factions of other priests who do this, all across the land. And. There was perhaps no better expert on exorcisms than Father Amorth.
He started as an assistant to the former chief exorcist of the Diocese of Rome, Cardinal Ugo Poletti. And then Father Amorth succeeded him and maintained his position for nearly three decades.
If you’re thinking that this all sounds like something out of a movie, you are right. Amorth’s work is the true story behind The Pope’s Exorcist, the 2023 horror film starring Russell Crowe.
That said, the International Association of Exorcists has spoken out against the movie, claiming it does not portray history — or exorcisms — accurately.
But let’s face it. This guy was complicated.
Gabriele Amorth was born on May 1, 1925, in Modena, Italy. He fought against the Nazis during WWII. Then he went into law. But then, in 1946, Amorth changed course and decided to be a priest. He was ordained in 1951.
But it wasn’t until 1986, when Amorth was 61 years old, that he started performing exorcisms. It wasn’t all about demons and devils though. According to the Associated Press, Amorth admitted that most of the people who came to see him — 98 percent — really needed the help of a psychiatrist rather than an exorcist.
Through it all, the priest has made some controversial statements.
He claimed that both Joseph Stalin and Adolf Hitler were possessed by the Devi. In 2011, he even declared that yoga was likewise the work of Satan.
Yoga wasn’t the only satanic pastime Amorth rebuked, though. According to the priest, using ouija boards and “reading Harry Potter” were also gateways to demons.
One of Amorth’s most controversial accusations involved the disappearance of 15-year-old Emanuela Orlandi. Orlandi vanished without a trace in June 1983, and Amorth said she had been kidnapped for a sex party involving Vatican police and foreign diplomats and then murdered.
I wish I had more to tell you about what actually went on in the rooms where those exorcisms were taking place.
But he is no longer.
Father Amorth died on Sept. 16, 2016, at the age of 91. In his last moments, he reportedly said, “When I get to the Good Place, I will continue to fight the Devil even harder.”
If I ever get to the Good Place, I hope there is absolutely no sign of the Devil. Whatsoever.
“”””””””””
“Good and evil both increase at compound interest. That is why the little decisions you and I make every day are of such infinite importance.” — C.S. Lewis
“”””””””””
“The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.” — Edmund Burke
“”””””””””
“In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.” — Martin Luther King Jr.
“”””””””””
“The world is a dangerous place to live; not because of the people who are evil, but because of the people who don’t do anything about it.” — Albert Einstein
“”””””””””
The Devil made him do it. Again and again and again.
