All persecution comes from the Devil himself – said Pope Francis in his homily at a Mass he celebrated this summer. He mentioned that the persecution of Christians can be traced back to the original and sole goal of Satan, which is to destroy humanity because humans are made in the image and likeness of God, whom the Devil hates. In our interview we asked an exorcist to explore the points raised by the Holy Father concerning the motivations behind the persecution of Christians and some other topics. This is the second part of the conversation (first part here).

When you become a trained exorcist, what comes next, what do you do, how do you live, how are your daily activities?

The best preparation is a life of prayer, penance, recollection, and study.

An exorcist should fast several times a week and have no cracks in his spiritual armour.

He needs time for retreats in silence as well as the study of the subject. Consulting with more experienced priests is also quite helpful. One needs lots of prayer support by people who are on a constant journey of conversion and penance.

When I am dealing with a case of possession, which I do on most days, I usually take between one and three hours for each person. When I am dealing with the person who is suffering a diabolical obsession or and oppression, then I spend 30 to 45 minutes with the person each time. It’s important to see these people once a week and not allow there to be many gaps of longer than a week between visits.

I recently had a case in which the exorcism continued violently for 13 hours. Needless to say, the possessed woman, my team members and I were pretty tired at the end of that day. Most of us were fasting so we hadn’t eaten anything all day. That was good.

There is a disproportionate fatigue that accompanies this work. Most possessed people experience a far shorter lifespan because of the toll it takes on their bodies. I have heard also that exorcists usually live shorter lives as a result of the fatigue. I’m not sure about this, but I’ll let you know when it’s time to put me in a box.

Do you need any special preparation before doing an exorcism?

Aside from the things I have already mentioned above, I bless the room before I do the exorcism and cast out any demons that are hanging around.  I bless the team members, the possessed person and myself with holy water. Frequent confession is a necessity for everyone; prayer and fasting, Eucharist and purity of heart. Devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary and patron saints.

How long does it take to cast out a demon?

It depends on many factors.

When I have had possessed children the case usually goes quite quickly because they are innocent and have not committed any grave sins. Further, if they are children, the demon has not been there very long and is not very deeply rooted. Those are demons that are kicked out quite easily and quickly.

Several contingencies will determine the gravity and depth and rootedness of a case. 

How did the person get possessed? Was it a curse? If so, was it done by a family member? If so, the corruption of the natural and supernatural order is very profound but this will be a case that requires much more time.

Is it a possession due to Freemasonry? In this case, it will be determined by the relationship with the mason. Was it one’s father, grandfather, or great-grandfather? Or did the possessed individual himself make masonic oaths and thus become possessed?

These are all different situations that will determine the length of the process.

What is the person’s moral life like? How were their lives before the possession took place? How was it after the possession took place? These two will determine the length of the process. Has there been any sexual promiscuity? Perversion, such as homosexuality? An abortion? These things will also determine the length of the process.

This work is not simply about kicking out demons.  We do that and it is necessary. But that is not the only goal of this ministry.

Above all, we seek conversion and healing. When there is conversion and healing beautiful things happen and the evil one has very little to hold onto.

Do you also find in your practice that there is an increasing number of possessions?

Most definitely.

What are the different levels of demonic activities in our lives?

There are two. Ordinary and extraordinary diabolical activity. The ordinary one is what we call temptation.

The extraordinary diabolical activity takes four forms:

• Infestation: diabolical presence in a building, an object, an animal, or region.
• Obsession: extraordinary diabolical influence on the person ’s psychology – usually resulting in very dark, obscene, violent, heavy thoughts out of one’s control.
• Oppression: attacking the person’s body, belongings, work, relationships, etc. This is more exterior.
• Possession: an extraordinary diabolical presence within the body.

Are we safe if we live in grace? If we have the Blessed Trinity dwelling in our souls we have all sorts of protections!

Of course, the sacraments and sacramentals are very important: the medal of St Benedict, the scapular, the rosary, holy water, a crucifix, etc..

But these are effective in as much as they are used with faith and devotion.

If I am not trying to imitate the virtues of the Blessed Virgin Mary in my life, my rosary will not be that effective.

Why has such a powerful being like Satan an interest in us, imperfect creatures?

Angels, from the very beginning, were ordered towards physicality in that they were created to serve the mystery of the Incarnation. When Satan and one-third of the angels fell, they were cursed by God to eat dust and crawl on their bellies. What do these words mean from Genesis? To crawl on your belly means to be humiliated. Man is made from dust and, as we hear in the Ash Wednesday liturgy, we will return to dust.   So when Satan was told that he was to eat dust, that meant that he was condemned to be entangled with humanity until the end of the world.

When a demon possesses a person it is making a mockery of the Incarnation as well as the doctrine of grace, the divine indwelling.

Everything Satan does is a mockery of Christ and the Catholic Church. When God the Father said, “Behold my beloved son in whom I’m well pleased” on the Mount of the Transfiguration, it is followed up with the scene of a man who brings his possessed son to Christ’s inept apostles. This is the Satanic response to the Transfiguration– mockery.

Zachary King, a former high wizard of a big satanic church in several of his interviews speaks about abortion as the supreme sacrifice for the Devil and about its importance in Satanic rituals and in performing black magic. Why is that so? Is it because of the God-likeness that the innocent baby holds? 

This is true. Satanists often enter into abortion clinics and do their rituals as the abortions are being carried out, offering the baby as a sacrifice.

When the Satanist does this he believes he will receive special perks from Lucifer.

Meanwhile, in the western world’s post-Christian cultures we live in extremely good conditions while our Christian brethren are heavily persecuted in Asia, Africa and the Middle East. As our wealth and moral decadence grows to the extent of disintegrating our societies, more than 200 million Christians have to face persecution, praying for their lives and survival. It seems that Satan is on the winning side of both ends of today’s world. Is that so?

Yes, it can get very discouraging and we have to be careful not to allow Satan to affect us through a type of secondary oppression, which means depression and discouragement as a result of his work in the world. We avoid this despair by immersing ourselves in the heart of Christ in adoration, in the Eucharist, in charitable deeds, in striving to do the will of the Father in order to give him glory with our little lives. If we do not choose to live this way, we are left with two choices: we can either despair or put our heads in the sand and live superficial lives. Neither of these two options is acceptable for a true follower of Christ.

We have to remember that whatever Satan accomplishes in this world is permitted by God.

Persecution of Christians means the glory of martyrs. The possession of Christ’s faithful means the sanctification of those people who successfully cooperate with the itinerary of deliverance. We cannot forget providence in all of this, darkness in the light of faith isn’t enough to see us through this present darkness.

How are we going to turn the tides back? How can we turn these trends back?

This starts with our own holiness. We can look at the big picture and see everything wrong with the world and that can become a distraction to that which is wrong within me. It can also become an excuse for not becoming a saint. We begin with the conversion of our own heart, a habitual attitude of penance, reparation for our sins and those of the whole world, making reparation to the heart of Christ and the heart of his Blessed Mother, and, to the best of our ability, to carry out God’s will according to our state in life.

We cannot imagine what prayer means for the Mystical Body of Christ. One day, while driving, I said a prayer for a possessed woman who lived about 800 miles away from me. Immediately, she called me up and ask if I was praying for her. When I said yes I also asked her how she knew. She told me she heard a voice in her head: “That f’ing priest.” Of course, I laughed.

But it also reinforced my understanding of what every little prayer means not only to the heart of our Redeemer but also what it means in the dismantling of the kingdom of darkness.

Two 11-year-old girls were found in a shower room of their school armed with knives and axes somewhere in Florida ten days ago. They said that they wanted to kill their classmates and then to kill themselves because they wanted to go to hell. Observing the newly erected statue of the devil in Arkansas you can see two children adoring him. Is this a trend now;  are satanic sects interested in recruiting children?

Yes, indeed. We are seeing two trends:

an increase in the amount of Satanic activity, and the ever more overt representation of Satanic cult.

These things go together and have immersed themselves in popular culture. In just about any American airport, you can purchase voodoo dolls and in any toy store buy an Ouija board.

So, apparently, one must be 21 years old to buy alcohol in the United States but only eight years old to play with the Ouija board and possibly become possessed. It’s nuts.

The alarming example that you mention of the two girls in Florida, one 11 and the other 12 years old, makes us wonder what was going on in their families, what were they seeing on the Internet, what shows they were watching, their plans. Such precise planning and scheming are not typical of an 11 or 12-year-old child. They were instructed.

It’s important to have an eye for this when reading the newspaper and we come across killings that are seemingly senseless.

There is often an overt Satanic element that the police and the state do not want to admit or publicise. They are often afraid of creating more fear, I suppose.

One time during an exorcism, Satan boasted that since he could not capture the child mentioned in Revelation chapter 12, he sought revenge through surrogates: namely, abortion.

In that same exorcism, he also boasted that he was the intellectual author of Isis and  suicide bombing, claiming “they are all mine and it was my idea.”

I have no doubt he was telling the truth in both of these instances.

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