Deliver Us from Evil (27 page)

After the papal exorcism failed, Father Amorth, president and founder of the International Association of Exorcists, who had been asked to consult on the case, spent two hours conducting his own exorcism. During the ceremony, the demon jeered at the Pope's efforts, saying “Not even your [church] head can send me away.” Nor did the second ritual cure the woman. “This is a case where the possession is very, very strong,” Father Amorth reported. “From what can be foreseen by us exorcists, it will take years of exorcisms” to banish such a powerful demon that it could even resist the prayers of the Pope himself. The Pontiff, however, is said to have successfully exorcised another Italian woman in 1982.

Although the Catholic Church has downplayed the role of exorcism in recent years, its revision of the Roman Ritual and the Pope's own willingness to serve as an exorcist have affirmed that the nearly four-hundred-year-old ritual remains a very modern answer to the age-old problem of possession. Yet it can also be a dangerous undertaking because, as Father Martin says, when an exorcism fails—and the demon ultimately triumphs—all who participated in the ritual pay the price.

Still skeptical? Let me tell you about the worst case of diabolic evil I've ever encountered and the toll it took on everyone involved. In May of 1993, my partner Joe was in a terrible mood. He had a very bad headache, had just finished a rather annoying day at work, and was upset by a prediction a psychic we both knew had made a few days earlier: an attempt would be made on his life later that year. When the phone rang, he was greeted by a raspy, uneducated—and extremely familiar—male voice: “Having some problems, Joe?”

Joe immediately went on red alert. Ever since the psychic's prediction, he'd been expecting trouble—and here it was. This particular caller had an uncanny ability to sense when my partner was at a physical, emotional, or spiritual low—and he invariably chose those moments to get in touch. He was a New Jersey housepainter who, rather ironically, had the same name as the saint who drove Lucifer and his fallen angels out of heaven: Michael.

This Michael, however, was anything but angelic: Although he looked like a frail old grandfather—with a thin, bony face; pointy white beard; and pale, almost translucent skin—he'd been possessed by an extremely powerful demon for many years. Joe knew all about Michael's long ordeal since this was one of the first cases he'd investigated after entering the Work in 1986. My partner had also participated in two harrowing exorcisms for the housepainter—and paid a terrible price for his efforts to help, since he was almost killed during the first of these rituals.

In the bland, guarded tone he used for polygraph exams of vicious criminals, Joe asked, “What can I do for you, Michael?”

“I need another exorcism,” the painter said. “I'll be in New York for a few days in September, so that would be a good time.”

“Have things gotten worse for you?” my partner inquired, aware that the demon inside Michael had tormented him terribly after the previous exorcisms. At times the housepainter would suddenly become frozen in his footsteps, with a hideously contorted expression on his face, as the evil force suddenly seized control of his body—leaving him to stand there like a gargoyle until it released its grip.

“No one would want to switch places with me, that's for sure,” Michael said, then let out a harsh, high-pitched giggle. “Or maybe someone would? I'd do
anything
to be free!”

Joe shivered from a sudden chill. Even over the phone, on a beautiful spring day, a palpable feeling of evil emanated from this man. Although my partner sensed that getting involved with Michael again would be perilous, he didn't hesitate for a second.

“I'll call the bishop,” he promised. As soon as he hung up, Joe threw holy water on his phone, his usual practice after Michael called.

*   *   *

To prepare for what we knew would be an extraordinarily grueling and risky ritual, Joe brought audiotapes of Michael's previous exorcisms to our class so our investigators would know what we were up against. Normally, neither Joe nor I will play tapes of any unresolved case, because any time you give the demonic recognition, it's dangerous and can attract evil. Not only that, but this particular satanic force was extraordinarily powerful: so powerful, in fact, that Michael could actually attend church and even take Holy Communion, which is impossible in most cases of diabolical possession, where the person is incapable of praying at home, let alone in the presence of the Most Holy Eucharist.

Before playing the tapes, Joe gave the twelve students who'd gathered in my basement a stern warning. “I know some of you have assisted in exorcisms, but on a scale of one to ten, everything you've seen before is a one or two, and this is a nine. We're dealing with terrible stuff here—it's like the cases you've read about in Father Martin's book. This could be the kind of exorcism where the priest has a heart attack, because this demon is a real soul-killer. Believe me, I'm not being melodramatic when I say that if you choose to get involved in this case, you could literally be putting your life on the line.”

These words had a profound effect on our students, who were stunned to hear my normally calm partner speak so passionately. They were riveted to their chairs, hanging on his every word. I could feel their fear, but no one left.

After pausing for a moment, Joe continued. “If you have any physical or spiritual weakness, you could be attacked in those areas. If you have any health problem, it could be exacerbated by your involvement in this case. Or things may go wrong in your life or your marriage. You could be mentally attacked during the exorcism and face terror you can't even imagine. You could even walk out of the church with permanent psychological damage.”

Seeing how grim the students looked, Joe felt it was time to offer some encouragement. “Forewarned is forearmed,” he emphasized. “This is going to be the Olympics of exorcisms, so you have to do everything in your power to strengthen yourself, especially spiritually. I expect you to go to mass or the services of your faith every week without fail from now on.”

His large brown eyes scanned the room. Apparently feeling he was assessing the condition of their souls, a couple of the students looked as embarrassed as if they'd been caught smoking in church. All the people in our class are deeply religious, but they're also human and sometimes have spiritual lapses, like anyone else.

With a benevolent gesture that made Joe look more monkish than usual, my partner brushed his hand through the air as if to say “Don't worry about your past mistakes—just get on the right path now.”

I reminded the students that they were to start a black fast three days before the exorcism and go to midweek confession if they were Catholic, even if they'd been absolved of their sins the previous Sunday. “You want to be in a state of grace when you go up against this demon,” I said, feeling as if I were giving the patrolmen I supervise at the Four-Six their sector assignments. “And don't forget to pray the rosary—every day, if possible.”

I place great value on this form of devotion. During a period of difficulty in my marriage with Jen, I went to Our Lady of the Rosary Chapel to pray about our problems. When I finished, Sister Philomena, one of the nuns there, sensed I was troubled and asked if I prayed the rosary.

I had to admit that I wasn't
that
devout. “No, I don't, Sister,” I replied.

“Try it,” she said. Since then I've made the rosary part of my daily routine and find it an unfailing source of comfort and strength.

After reminding the students of our religious rules, Joe briefed them about Michael's background, which gave few clues about how the housepainter came to be possessed. Nor did the man himself have any recollection of when or how the demon entered him. Raised in a poor but religious Jewish family in New Jersey, Michael later converted to Catholicism. At eighteen, he enlisted in the Navy, hoping to better himself. He didn't take well to military discipline and often found himself in trouble for drinking, mouthing off to his superior officers, or getting into fights with other enlisted men. After his term of duty was up, he drifted from one menial job to another, eventually settling on a career as a housepainter. Despite being a rather difficult and quarrelsome man who had few friends, he wooed and won the affections of a young nurse, and married her in 1960.

At some point—he has no recollection of exactly when—Michael began feeling alienated from himself. “He told me that some of his thoughts seemed very strange, as if someone else had taken over his mind,” Joe told the class. “He also found it harder and harder to control his bad temper, which steadily got worse. To his horror, he became physically and psychologically abusive to his wife and children during these rages. At times he felt so full of hatred that he even frightened himself.”

Like many of the people who consult us, Michael tried psychological counseling without success. He also saw many doctors about his frequent, agonizing headaches and the sense of impending doom that sometimes overwhelmed him, but despite extensive medical tests and scans, they found no physical explanation for either ailment. There were also periods when these problems lifted on their own, sometimes for months or even years on end, but the darkness always returned.

Gradually Michael started to see that his problems were in the spiritual realm. As sometimes happens, this demon had attacked without warning, skipping the stages of infestation and oppression. Instead, it invaded like a thief in the night, taking over this man with such stealth that he didn't know exactly when or how it entered him. He consulted clergymen of all denominations, and attended Jewish, Pentecostal, Baptist, and Catholic healing services, none of which helped. Through a priest in Queens who holds this type of healing masses, Michael learned about Joe, who told him about the bishop's frequent success in casting out evil spirits.

My partner's investigation turned up some indications that Michael may have been cursed by his mother-in-law, who was of a different faith, and bitterly opposed his marriage to her daughter. Even many years later this sour, reclusive woman continued to be extremely hostile to him.

“Was she some kind of witch?” asked Chris, our teenaged investigator, who had come to the class with his parents, Rose and Phil.

“I don't know,” Joe said. “Since Michael was never invited to her house, he couldn't tell me if any signs of the occult were present. But it's certainly possible.”

When he began looking into the housepainter's problems, Joe—who was then a novice at the Work—didn't realize the old man was possessed. A small but telling incident tipped him off, my partner told us. “I had invited Michael to my home for dinner, and as we ate, it started snowing heavily. Because the driving conditions were so bad and this man lived a considerable distance away, I invited him to spend the night. During dinner, he seemed extremely uncomfortable—and now insisted on heading home, despite the blizzard outside. He later told me that the religious articles in my home were causing him actual physical pain, a feeling like spikes were digging into his spine and neck.”

Joe encountered what he's convinced is the same demon in another case a few years later, which involved a mother and daughter who had practiced witchcraft. He said, “When several of us, including two psychics, went to their home at the bishop's request, one of the psychics actually felt this demon crawling on her skin: The mental picture she got was of a scorpion with spikes. I suspect that this demon came to her, and possibly Michael, through a curse created during a Brazilian black magic ceremony.”

Although not psychic, Joe has also seen this demon in his mind's eye on several occasions. To him, it didn't look like an insect but something even more frightening. “Its face was inhuman. The best word to describe it is reptilian. It resembled a lizard, with big teeth and bat wings. Hatred was all over it.”

But why would a South American demon possess a New Jersey housepainter? Joe had a theory: “During her lifetime, Michael's mother-in-law, who died a few years before I met him, owned a business that employed many South American workers. Since many forms of black magic are practiced in these countries, she may have found a sorcerer among these workers and hired him to curse her son-in-law.”

When Joe mentioned this, I was reminded of an investigation I was involved in, where a man was possessed by seven demons. We had that many exorcisms, and each time, the bishop would ask the evil spirit, “How many are you?” The answer would always correspond to the number of exorcisms that had been held, because at each ritual, one more demon would be cast out, forcing the next, more powerful demon forward. Each ceremony increased in violence, to the point where we all felt it wise to have a medical doctor on hand. After a frenzied struggle on the part of the possessed lasting well over thirty minutes, the doctor checked the man's vital signs. In an astonished whisper, the physician told me that his patient's heart rate was as calm as if he'd been sitting on a couch watching TV—while every one of the assistants was exhausted from the battle.

Curiously, this case also involved a curse by a relative. This man had an evil stepfather who incited the Devil to attack him, leading to the stepson's possession. As a rather understandable result, the younger man had developed an extreme loathing of his stepfather, which actually amplified the curse, since the demonic gain strength from negative emotions. Due to the intense hatred inside this man, his exorcisms weren't successful until he finally consented to forgive his stepfather. Once he did this, he was finally freed.

While the reason for Michael's possession remained unclear, there was no doubt about the ferocity of the demon inside him. Although my partner wasn't present at this man's first exorcism by Bishop McKenna, he still paid for having set it up, I told the class. At the exact moment when the Roman Ritual was beginning in Connecticut, Joe was walking down a sidewalk in New York City, when a van roared out of a nearby gas station and slammed into him. Fortunately, the blow flung him to the side of the vehicle, so he escaped certain death from its wheels, but he was left with agonizing injuries that took weeks to heal.