The other night I made the
mistake of watching The Devil and Father
Amorth alone and just before going to bed. The documentary, made by The Exorcist director William Friedkin,
follows a real-life exorcism that took place just outside of Rome in the summer
of 2016. The film itself, whilst interesting, leaned towards embellishment and
shock tactics and should certainly be taken with a pinch of salt. However,
Friedkin’s interviews with neuroscientists and psychiatric professionals
regarding the tape of the real exorcism warrant discussion, particularly in the
light of the recent increasing demand for exorcisms across the western world.
At the beginning of the documentary,
Friedkin makes the claim that 500,000 exorcisms are carried out every year in
Italy. This is supported by reports that the Vatican is now training
exorcists at a greater rate than ever before. In the last decade, the
number of trained exorcists in the US has quadrupled from 12 to 50 in an
attempt to keep up with demand. In the UK, claims of enforced
exorcisms have left people traumatised. This all sounds like Middle Ages
witchcraft, but these incidents have all occurred since 2015. The devil is
getting busier.
A fascinating book by Jennifer
Percy, Demon Camp: A Soldier’s Exorcism
details a Christian camp in Georgia that ‘rehabilitates’ US veterans of the wars
in Iraq and Afghanistan through exorcising their demons from them. Many claim
that the priests worked miracles. The subject of the book, Caleb, was suicidal
and suffering with severe PTSD upon his return from Afghanistan, but it was a
dark presence that he felt following his every move that eventually led him to
an exorcism. In a bid to rid himself of the ‘Black Thing’, he turned to the
priests, and from them he received some respite.
The parallels between demonic
possession and mental illness are numerous (consider Caleb’s ‘Black Thing’ and
it’s similarity to Winston Churchill’s description of his depression as the ‘Black
Dog’ that followed him). Many of the symptoms of demonic possession are also
associated with PTSD; watching Cristina’s (the subject of Father Amorth’s
exorcism attempt) violent reactions to her exorcism could be compared to the
panicked responses to trigger events in sufferers of PTSD – the soldier who
hits the ground when a firework explodes behind them – and her claim to not
remember the ritual also shares similarities with the experience of PTSD
episodes. In Friedkin’s film, a psychiatrist compares Cristina’s reactions to
those of patients suffering with delirium and hallucinations.
As someone with an interest in
psychology it is easy to reduce stories of demonic possession to something I
better understand; mental illness. However, as Friedkin’s interviews with
neuroscientists and psychiatrists highlight, it is not always possible for
science to explain an individual’s behaviour. There are things in the mind that
we simply do not understand. The problem with people, though, is that we do not
like what we cannot explain. Humans are
hardwired to find meaning in everything, regardless of whether it is there or
not. That is why we might lay awake at night overthinking a single sentence
that someone said to us in passing that day – what did they mean, why would
they say it like that? It is why we find patterns and pictures in the clouds
that pass overhead. Everything has a reason. That much we believe.
But sometimes we cannot find that
reason, and that scares the hell out of us. Friedkin introduces Father Amorth
by stating that his first fight against evil came as a young man, when he
joined the resistance against Mussolini’s fascist regime. As soldiers,
revolutionaries, and Hollywood movies will tell you, having something to fight
for, or against, will give life meaning. It makes what you are doing
worthwhile. Where we stumble is where we do not know what it is that we are
fighting. As poor, possessed Cristina put it when describing her desire to take
part in her ninth exorcism (as the previous eight had been unsuccessful): “Father
Amorth was funny and ironic. He didn’t scare me. He helped me to understand
what was happening to me.” Her ‘spiritual illness’ that had resulted in her
being unable to keep a job and struggling to maintain relationships now had a
diagnosis, and the exorcisms were her treatment. So far they had not worked,
but now she had a potential cure she could try.
In the room where the exorcism
took place, surrounded by her family and friends, listening to the
authoritative words of Father Amorth and feeling the effects of the Rite on the
demon inside her, Cristina was fighting her affliction. Her family were
fighting it with her. As one psychiatrist interviewed after watching the video
put it, together they created a ‘shared meaning’ of the events that unfolded.
It gave both Cristina and her family hope that she would be cured. They
believed in its effectiveness. Even in psychiatric therapy, before treatment
can work the patient must want help, and then they must believe that it will be
effective. The patient must be open to the suggestions of the therapist and
willing to engage with the process in order for progress to be made. If you
believe in it, it will work.
For individuals like Cristina who
are suffering and have no diagnosis an exorcism provides context for their
affliction. For soldiers like Caleb, who have experienced the most horrific
things and are struggling to deal with the psychological consequences of that,
a demon makes a good scapegoat. If you know what the problem is you can fight
against it, even if that problem is the devil. In an uncertain and unstable
world, at a time where we are only just beginning to understand the myriad
reasons why we think, act, and feel the way we do, exorcism, as scary as it
might be, can be a comfort to some people who need answers. Or maybe that is
just what I’m telling myself so I can sleep at night...
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