exorcists

Any of the presentations by Father Vincent Lampert or Father Gary Thomas are good and can be found on YouTube. Lampert is the exorcist for Indianapolis, IN, and Thomas is the exorcist for San Jose, CA. There are about 125 in the US. The talks have been good for me because they are corrective and sobering. They are not scary or sensational.

In his lecture and question and answer session on Oct 19, 2021, he said that calls to the Church for the rite increased during COVID, and some calls are coming from non-Catholics. He receives 8-10 calls or emails every day. He said he is trained to be a skeptic. Not all calls result in an exorcism, because there could be something else that is wrong with the person, mental or physical. A medical doctor or psychiatrist is consulted first. As I mentioned in another post, Anthony Hopkins consulted with Thomas for the 2011 film, The Rite.

One thing Lampert said that I did not know is that an exorcism is a liturgical rite. I know it is contained in a book and is recited word-for-word, but an English translation has been approved and the book recently updated, the old book having been unchanged since 1647.