Vatican exorcist blames Satan for Catholic Church's woes
'The Devil resides in the Vatican and you can see the consequences'
The devil lives in the Vatican and is to blame for the problems in the Catholic Church, says the Vatican's chief exorcist.
"The Devil resides in the Vatican and you can see the consequences," Father Amorth, 85, who has been the Holy See's chief exorcist for 25 years, said in the Telegraph. "He can remain hidden, or speak in different languages, or even appear to be sympathetic. At times he makes fun of me. But I'm a man who is happy in his work."
Amorth was interviewed by Marco Tosatti for "Memoirs of an Exorcist."
"In the Vatican there are members of Satanic sects," Amorth told Tosatti, according to the Catholic News Agency. "There are priests, monsignors and also cardinals!
"I know from those who have been able to relate it to me because they had a way of knowing directly. And it's something 'confessed' most times by the very demon under obedience during the exorcisms."
The Daily Mail reports:
"Father Amorth also said that the attempt on the life of the late Pope John Paul II in May 1981 and the recent attack on Pope Benedict XVI during Christmas Eve Mass last year were all work of the Devil."
The Telegraph also reported:
"In a rare insight into the world of exorcism, the Italian priest told La Repubblica newspaper that the 1973 film 'The Exorcist' gave a 'substantially exact' impression of what it was like to be possessed by the Devil.
"People possessed by evil sometimes had to be physically restrained by half a dozen people while they were exorcised. They would scream, utter blasphemies and spit out sharp objects, he said.
" 'From their mouths, anything can come out – pieces of iron as long as a finger, but also rose petals," said Amorth, who claims to have performed 70,000 exorcisms. 'When the possessed dribble and slobber, and need cleaning up, I do that too. Seeing people vomit doesn't bother me. The exorcist has one principal duty - to free human beings from the fear of the Devil.' "
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