Bone-Chilling Interview with a Real-Life Exorcist (Fr. Vince Lampert)

hello and welcome to capturing christianity i'm cameron bertuzzi and today we're talking about exorcisms with the real life exorcist father vincent lampert is that the way they pronounce your name lampert or is it or is it silent there no it's father vince lampert you got it right perfect all right well yeah i've got uh father vincent lampert who is one of i think in your book you said one out of 125 exorcists currently operating in the in the united states is that correct or is that number grown that number has grown significantly the actual number really isn't known every catholic bishop is an exorcist by virtue of their office if you will and then if a bishop decides he can appoint one or more of his priest to do a an exorcism so any priest could be appointed some bishops have chosen to appoint a stable exorcist in their diocese so i believe there's about 125 of us that have that official appointment from our bishops across the united states but there could be more there could be more some are publicly known and some choose to rema remain anonymous well if you don't know who father vince lampert is then uh let me just give you a quick introduction i'll give i'll let him fill out a little bit more he's an american roman catholic priest and he's the designated exorcist of the roman catholic archdiocese in indianapolis father vincent received his exorcism training in rome actually but i would like to ask you is there anything that you would like to fill in here what am i missing about you i was ordained a priest in 1991 so i've been a priest now for 29 years and i received my appointment as an exorcist back in 2005. so this is a ministry that i've been doing for the past 15 years i currently serve as the pastor of two parishes in brookville indiana st michael and saint peter which is about 35 miles outside of cincinnati ohio that's great well uh let me actually before we get into the interview we're going to talk about all all about exorcisms and some of his own personal experiences it's going to be really really interesting but we're about nine days away from halloween and i think that was part of the reason why we scheduled this at this time halloween is coming up and i just wanted to give a couple interesting halloween facts that you uh that might interest you all right here's number one this will be the first halloween in 19 years to have a full moon i should have had some like sound effects ready here like uh uh so yeah first halloween 19 years to have a full moon next one won't be until 2039 i believe so another 19 years consumers spend about 9 billion a year on halloween that's insane it's ridiculous america here's number fact number three americans buy enough candy each halloween to fill six titanics actually this is each week every week they can fill six titanics of candy also ridiculous uh number four kind of interesting the fastest pumpkin carving record belongs to stephen clark this guy named stephen clark he carved a complete face eyes nose mouth and ears in 16.47 seconds pretty cool pretty fast all right number five and then we'll get to the real stuff pumpkins are a fruit not a vegetable pretty interesting did you know that i did i don't think i really knew that the last i didn't know it either until i pumpkin ice cream pumpkin pie so i guess it makes sense yeah apparently was it botanist they don't classify fruits as just whatever is sweet it's got to have like some certain other properties uh anyway all right let's get to the real me the real purpose of this show today we're talking about exorcism so i mentioned that you have a book it's called exorcism i forget the subtitle of it but it's it's all about exorcism it's what i really liked about it was that it was very very informative that figure that i got earlier there's 125 people more now but it's just very informative about what the process looks like there's a whole lot of interesting information we're going to get into some of that today in the interview and then toward the end we're going to do some q a so if you have a question for a father vincent that you'd like to ask him then just keep it in your mind or send it as a super chat a super chat is pretty much your guarantee to get a question out there today and those are real easy for me to go back in the lives in the live chat and find so if you'd like to send your question make sure that it gets answered today to send it as a super chat also help us it helps us out so let's get into uh some of the questions so at what point in your life as because in your book you mentioned that you grew up catholic what point did you decide that you wanted to become an exorcist well the bigger question is when i decided to become a priest so right out of high school i attended indiana university in bloomington indiana for two years and then after that decided to enter the seminary i jokingly tell people that conversion is possible even in bloomington indiana so decided to pursue a calling to the priesthood that i felt like i got when i was in grade school so again i was ordained a priest in 1991 and then in 2005 my bishop was looking for a replacement to be the exorcist for indianapolis the the priests who had done the ministry had passed away in july of that year ironically he was the pastor of the parish where i attended grade school never thought that one day i would get one of his jobs so the bishop selected me saying he wanted a priest who believed in the reality of evil but not one who would be too quick to believe that everyone who came to him was actually dealing with the demonic in their lives that's interesting that's that's part of uh in some of the interviews that i've seen you do and even in your book you mentioned how you're you're actually taught to be a skeptic in from the from the roman church you're taught to be skeptical ex or a demon possession something like that is like the last thing that you want to conclude and you even say again going back to your book it's like the figure is what one in 5 000 people are actually demon-possessed according to these different criteria that are laid out what would you say um to to a skeptic i can see hearing something like this and being like well we know that demon possession is just not a thing and so you've made a mistake in ruling out these other sort of naturalistic possibilities how would you respond to a skeptic well you're right exorcists are trained to be skeptics ourselves we need to exhaust every other possible explanation for what is happening in the life of a person before labeling that person as possessed and needing special prayers of the church so the church says that i need to reach moral certitude that beyond a doubt i believe that this is something of a demonic nature so the church will utilize experts in the mental health field as well as medical doctors so the church wants these professionals to weigh in basically saying is there something about this person's condition that is beyond your training or understanding the church is not asking the psychiatrist or the doctor do you believe this person is possessed the church herself will make that determination but the church does want to make the best possible judgment and so wants these experts to weigh in on the matter i often believe that if the church was too quick to label somebody as being possessed and that label prevents the person from getting the true help they need such as from a psychiatrist or a psychologist then the church will be doing greater harm so again the church wants to provide the person with the help they truly need not necessarily the help they think they need and that help could be spiritual it could be mental or it could be physical going back to the book again i might just be referencing it every time i speak you were talking about your first i think it was your first experience in a real life exorcism and you mentioned that the was it the priest who was actually con conducting it you were in the room with him and you were kind of like what am i getting myself into but you mentioned what was interesting is you mentioned that he was doing all of these different things he like brought in a paper towel roll he brought in a little bag and he like set it on the the radiator and he was just right like prepared for all these things to happen like foaming at the mouth he just like blotted it out a little bit put it in the in the little plastic bag but he throughout this what he was doing you mentioned remembering that he just had no fear is that is that something that eventually like were you fearful in that moment and if so is that something that's gone away over the over time absolutely i think fearful at the beginning was natural just to see things that aren't a normal part of your everyday life you know again in that case the person once the demon manifested the eyes rolled in the back of their head they began foaming at the mouth and so looking at that that is kind of fearful because i had just been speaking with this person and there was no indication that there was a demonic presence and then when the priest who was training me after he brought in the plastic bag and the paper towels he came in and began the ritual of the church and when he blessed the person with holy water as soon as the water hit that person is when the demon manifested so there was kind of the growling and snarling and that's when the the foaming at the mouth began in the eyes and i think my eyes might have gotten really big as well thinking what in the world have i gotten myself into and certainly over the years you know i i've come to not focus on the manifestations of evil because when the demon a demon manifest is basically saying look at what i'm capable of doing and the exorcist is trained to focus on what god is doing in this particular prayer of the church the priest who trained me had been an exorcist for 25 years when i was receiving training from him which is why i think he was unfazed by all of this and over the years i've come you know everyone's always interested in the manifestations it always brings a lot of attention people like to hear those stories but an exorcist will tell you the focus is really on the power of god that is at work in this particular prayer of the church so of all the exorcisms that you've been a part of which one that you think back to still sort of gives you chills when you think about it i would say it was the very first one that i was involved in after returning from rome in 2006. so i began working with the lady who uh it was determined that there were seven demons identified in her and she shared with me the story that she believed that a friend of hers was possessed so out of a misguided sense of charity she went up to her looked her in the eye and said what's ever in you i freely invite to come in to me and then she felt a presence come over her and then she turned to the church 12 years after this event and then in working with her these two these seven different demons name themselves the weakest of the demons are always the first to go the one that's of a more dominant nature is always the weakest to go and this one particular demon told me its name was the demon leviathan which is the demon mentioned in the bible and the demon told me it did not have to leave because it had been invited in and because it had been invited in it was making a claim on the life of this person and so i worked with this lady over the course of one year before she was finally liberated from all the demonic presence in her life so in this case how did you determine that she was possessed rather than suffering some kind of like serious mental illness she she went to see a psychiatrist who gave me a written report i required her to go see her family doctor just to rule out that there wasn't some physical cause so there is a a protocol used in the united states for us to determine whether or not this is truly demonic so step one go see a mental health expert step two see your family doctor step three i would look for signs of the demonic that the church has identified there are four signs the ability to speak and understand languages otherwise unknown to the individual superhuman strength beyond the normal capacity of the individual having elevated perception knowledge about things a person should not otherwise know and then an aversion to anything of a sacred nature such as being blessed with holy water being shown a crucifix having the bible placed on your head during a prayer so all of these could be indications of demonic presence step four as i have a questionnaire the vatican has put out a questionnaire that the exorcist can use to determine if this truly is demonic then what was the entry point some examples of questions would be have you ever been involved in the occult have you been uh you know engaged in satanic practices or rituals witchcraft or magic what types of books or literature do you read so again the church is trying to determine if this is demonic where did the entry point come from step five very significant help the person resume their normal spiritual life or to help them create that for the very first time so again because the church wants to move in a very methodical process exorcisms are never done hastily or quickly i always remind people that there's no such thing as an emergency exorcism when they're done too hastily is usually when things get out of hand maybe the person really was dealing with a mental health issue but because the priest moved too quickly then the person was led to believe that this was truly something of a demonic nature so again the church wants to move in a very methodical way to give the person the true help that they need something interesting you mentioned in the book again is that demon possession is not like contagious so a lot of people are afraid that if a demon comes out of somebody it's just going to go into someone else like nearby would you mind dispelling that myth and then some of the other myths about exorcisms yeah we should never give demons more credibility than they deserve so a demon cannot just jump out of one person into another that might make for a great movie but it's just not reality one would have to create an entry point for evil into their lives people can do that directly when they're engaging in practices that can open up a doorway to evil indirectly when they're involved in things they think are fun or entertaining but in reality could be opening up an entry point you begin by talking about some facts about halloween so halloween may be fun and entertaining for most people but it is possible that by doing some of the activities associated with halloween people could be opening up an entry point for evil into their lives so demons are still creatures they're not cree you know we should never put a demon and god on the same plane field there's always a difference between god who god who is the creator and a demon that is a fallen angel but still a creature of god so a creature could never be on equal footing with god the creator what are some other myths about exorcisms uh i always jokingly say that uh they're never performed in an abandoned house on a dead-end street during an electrical storm that might make a great movie but again the church will always determine where an exorcism will take place so the devil doesn't get to determine where he will be defeated so exorcisms are always done in a sacred space so in a church or in a chapel the person who's possessed is present myself a family member or friend of the possessed i will invite another priest or perhaps a deacon a layperson so there could be someone there but they're they're just to pray there's no such thing as exorcism tourism so nobody's there out of a sense of curiosity because when a demon manifests it will try to determine who's the weakest link in the room and then try to disrupt the prayer of the church by either physically or even verbally attacking the person again trying to take control of this particular prayer of the church exorcisms can be repeated over and over again it's not always one and done but each time an exorcism is is performed even though the person may not achieve total liberation it does provide them some benefit an exorcism is not magical you know the things that the priests will use holy water a crucifix you know there's no power in those things they always point to something greater jesus is the exorcist he's not a bystander during this prayer of the church he is the main actor so i don't have any powers or abilities if we're relying on me just as who i am as a person we're all in trouble but if we're relying on the power and the authority of christ that he's given to his church and that is displayed through his ministers that's the right mentality to have exorcisms can be performed on non-catholics more than half the people who contact me are not catholic they come from other faith traditions christian faith traditions other world religions and sometimes no religious background whatsoever but exorcism is the ministry of the church so the church will help anyone who turns to her because again a ministry of charity it's a ministry of compassion so i think a lot of people are probably at least the people that are watching this stream right now a lot of you are skeptical about demon possession and about demons in general how would you convince somebody or what would you say to somebody who's just skeptical about the whole thing like maybe you're just making these stories up to to get attention yeah what depends on the where one begins you know if you're a person of faith believing is seeing if you're don't really have that faith then you say see and is believing so it's coming at it from two different angles but again the basis i would have is what the church has consistently taught throughout you know the church's two thousand year old history is that evil is something personified in what we call the devil and these other fallen angels no evil is not just humanity's inhumane treatment of one another it's not just something of our own making but there is something personified in evil again that we call the devil and evil spirits and the church has consistently taught that throughout her history and it's backed up by sacred scripture well then tell me tell me another uh so you've been part of some exorcisms that when when these people are possessed and the well it's really the demon if if if there is such a thing as demon possession it's the demons that are doing these sort of supernatural things and the four criteria that you mentioned what's an example of someone explicitly exemplifying or a demon exemplifying one of those one of those things supernatural uh knowledge or power or knowing some language or even levitating i've seen stories about levitation tell me some some of these stories that you've seen personally what's important to know that a demon can act on a person's memory and so the real challenge is when these manifestations begin the demon is really working on the mind of those who are there the memory and imagination so are these things truly happening or is the demon causing myself and others to believe that what we see is real which again is why exercise are trained not to focus on these things but you're right some of the examples of manifestations we mentioned a few eyes rolled in the back of the head foaming at the mouth exhibiting superhuman strength i've seen demons manifest and pick up items like a a metal swivel desk chair with just one hand lifted over their head the person that did this didn't even weigh a hundred pounds speaking languages otherwise unknown speaking in latin or in ancient greek uh other examples with the slithering on the ground like a snake again all of these things are meant to instill fear i personally witnessed someone levitate people have shared stories about once the demon manifests it crawls up the wall like a spider so again these things are all meant to instill fear and one of the things you said is very important the distinction must always be made between the person as an individual and the actions now of the demon once they've taken over the person's body treating that body as if it were its own so exorcists are trained to make the distinction between the person as someone created in the image and likeness of god and now the demon that is treating that body as if it were its own let's talk about the the philosophy behind demon possession how how can something like that be possible how can a spiritual being take over a physical being and make them do things how is that possible well nothing happens in the demonic world that god does not permit and that's true of all reality you know god permits many things to happen doesn't mean that that's god desires them to happen but god does permit things to happen so why would a demon be interested in possessing a human body and the answer is at the very core of christianity the greatest thing that god ever did for us is the incarnation took on human form and the person of jesus christ so the devil or some other demon who wishes to mimic god in each and every way believes that he takes on human form by possessing a human body and when they possess the human body it's using the person's voice to speak their hands to give gestures their feet to walk but again once the demon takes over then all of the actions are now wholly defined by the demon itself so well the question is how does that happen how can a spiritual being like a demon actually take possession over somebody and make them do things like is it do they implant themselves in in the soul is it the like is it neurons that they're fiddling with what what does that actually have what is happening it's not in the soul there can be no actual connection between a human soul and a uh and a demon so it's always of a physical nature and that comes about goes back to what we touched on earlier if someone is creating an entry point whereby they are are inviting a demon into their life you know as a pure spiritual creature doesn't occupy time and space as we do you know you're in a room right now i'm in a room the room is containing us a spirit isn't contained by space it contains the space now that can kind of give you a headache to think about it for a moment but as a pure spirit with intellect and will is not contained by space it contains the space so when one chooses to open up an entry point to evil into their life it literally is that now the evil spirit is containing them they've either pushed god away and invited the demon now to contain them and that's how the manifestations then will begin and take place so it's a physical so it's an analogy i was thinking about was it be like a demon coming in and like pushing the person out of the driver's seat into the passenger seat and then the demon sits in the driver's seat and starts driving the the car so to speak in the car is the analogy of the body something like that yeah yes and when that happens people i've worked with some are fully aware of what's taking place but they feel as if they're a prisoner trapped in their own body they're incapable of stopping what's taking place other people i've worked with have told me that once the demon took over they lose all recollection of what was taking place let's think about some other natural explanations of what could have happened in these cases so when you you mentioned levitation what could have been happening there that is not supernatural do you know what it means to like go ahead i was going to say it could have been just something that i believe that i was seeing because at the time the person was shaking very violently and then i saw them rise up out of the chair and then that's when the priest reached over and put his hand on the head of the person and pushed them back in the chair now there was another priest in the room and we talked about it later but he didn't see it so i saw it he didn't obviously the priest doing the exorcism witnessed something to reach over and push the person back down into the chair by putting their hand on their head what about the the one where the the person grabbed the table steel table and raised it above their head with one hand yeah well again were you the only one that was the uh no that i would never do an exorcism alone so there's always other people that are present certainly myself i will have somebody else with me and then the person that's possessed and then a family member of friends so it's it's never a one-on-one setting and so there were other people in the room that saw this person grab this table above their head yes yep and there was no way they could have done that on their own volition not from the uh the physical capacity of the person it would have just been impossible unless i guess you could say that their adrenaline was just on such a rush and a high that at that moment they just were able to do something beyond their normal human capacity but again it's important to remember that leading up to the point of doing the exorcism the person has gone through a psychiatric evaluation they've gone through the physical evaluation and these experts have said we can't explain what is happening in the life of the person if one were to go through because you know some people that are dealing with mental health issues schizophrenia they can act out some of the very same symptoms that we would see in people who are demon-possessed and so you want to rule out those possibilities first exactly right now what's interesting i was going to say i worked with a gentleman one time who was diagnosed as being schizophrenic he didn't necessarily like it so he talked to a priest who then referred him to me and i met with him and i told him this was not something demonic this was truly something of a mental health issue he already had a psychiatrist and a a caseworker that was assigned to him and i just didn't want to say ah no it's not demonic be on your way so i arranged a meeting for the four of us so me and him his psychiatrist and caseworker and the psychiatrist says to the man father says you're not possessed what is your response and his response was rather interesting from my point of view he said i'm disappointed he said if it was a demon i would understand why i act the way that i do he looked at the psychiatrist and said you can tell me that i'm schizophrenic but you but you can't tell me why he goes if it's the devil that i have my why so there are some people again who want it to be something demonic but again i can't tell people what they want to hear i have to tell people what i believe they truly need to hear you know either yes this is truly something demonic based on my understanding by training my education or know this is truly something of a mental health issue or of a physical nature that needs to be addressed by a psychiatrist or your family doctor i i appreciate the fact that you are wanting and not just you but just priests everywhere who are doing exorcisms i appreciate the fact that you go that route first you want to rule out all of these other possibilities as you said in the book it's like one out of five thousand people are actually classify as demon possessed and so for the vast majority of people 499 499 people you're pointing them to the relevant experts who are trained to handle mental health issues or drug abuse or whatever else they might be dealing with you're not going to and as you said you even said that like some people some priests will get a little bit too quick to diagnose demon possession and then things can just get worse from there so i appreciate the fact that you you do that and so that's that's really good so i have one more question that i want to ask you and then we're going to turn to some audience q a we've already got one super chat that was sent in and i'll get to that just after i ask my question here so yeah as you know i'm a protestant so do you think that exorcisms provide evidence not just for the reality of demons but for the claims of the catholic church well my first response would be that the catholic church certainly does not have a monopoly on the practice of exorcism it is a liturgical right for catholics so we have a prescribed way for it to be performed but certainly exorcisms can take place in other christian traditions so there is not a monopoly that we have but again the focus really isn't on the exorcist or even the church per se i would say that it's something even greater it's about the power of jesus christ so again when we look in scripture jesus sent his disciples out he gave them the power to expel demons he gave them the power to cure illness jesus makes a distinction between the two and certainly the power of christ is at work in the lives of many many individuals i will say that there's a lot of people that i've learned over the years that at least when it comes to the issue of exorcism we'll turn to the catholic church because the catholic church still readily and openly talks about the reality of evil the ministry of exorcism i know many protestant pastors in my area and oftentimes they will send people to talk to me when they say that they're dealing with the demonic you know we're not in competition with one another i always like to say that people of faith you know it's not like at the end of the day we can say i have a bigger piece of god than you do hahaha again the focus should be on bringing people to a relationship with christ in their life and i think exorcism is a way of of doing that it lets people know the reality and the power of god that is at work in the christian faith do you know any person i'm going to ask one more question do you personally know any any priests or other catholic uh you want to call them colleagues are you familiar with any catholic priests that are skeptical of the existence of demons oh absolutely yeah so skepticism isn't just outside of the church it's inside of the church as well when when the archbishop of indianapolis announced at a gathering of priests that he was appointing me to this ministry there were several priests who laughed and said i didn't think we believed in that anymore so skepticism is inside and outside of the church well you even mentioned in vatican ii that a lot of people point or a lot of catholics point to vatican ii as giving some kind of reason to doubt the existence of demons yet you point out how it's consistently discussed or it's it's satan and demons are mentioned over and over and over in vatican 2. they are the second vatican council mentions the reality of evil more than any other ecumenical council of the church you know coming out of the 1960s it was in 1972 pope paul began to speak about the devil you know popes have a general audience every wednesday and when he began doing that at his general audience i think he caught people off surpri by surprise because most people just figured that the church no longer even talked about the the reality of the devil but i always like to put it in a christian perspective if jesus is a name that means god saves what is he saving us from it can't just be from a bad day i would go on to say that he's saving us from something real and something evil namely the devil himself and his demons all right let's get to some audience q a here we've got one question from john bass i believe yep says if jesus and the apostles conducted exorcisms with relative ease why are catholic exorcisms so drawn out not all of them are drawn out i would say there's always i've done exorcisms that are done in like 30 minutes or less some that are take longer i think it depends on the strength of the the demon it depends on whether or not the person truly wants liberation and it's not just about wanting liberation the person has to be able or wanting to invite christ in i will say that i've learned over the years that there seems to be a difference between exorcisms performed in what i would call the pagan world so someone who's never heard the good news of jesus christ and in the apostate world someone who's heard the good news of christ but now they've turned their back on him you know we live in the western world where many people who grew up in traditional christian homes are no longer practicing their faith it's my experience that the devil seems to have a greater control over these people because they heard the good news they had a relationship with christ and then they walked away from it i traveled to south africa three years ago and uh while i was there performed some exorcisms and while there people who had never heard of christ never been baptized when the exorcisms were performed they were immediate and effective so i make the distinction between what i would call exorcisms in the pagan world and the in the apostate world and i would say that here in the western world here in the united states i would classify us as the apostate world meaning we've really walked away from our christian underpinnings so every now and then i like to mention on the on the live stream that the reason why you're seeing the lights behind me change colors is when people send in a super chat depending on how much they send in so if it's five dollars i think it turns green or yellow or that you can change the color of the lights behind me by staying in a super chat to make it a little bit more interactive so i only mention that because a lot of people are asking why do the lights behind you change it's because you guys are interacting and and making them change basically so here's the next question from thejason909 says father lampert what would you say is the correlation between psychiatric diagnoses schizophrenia and disassociative identity and possession the correlation between the two so the question would be i guess as i hear that is is it always demon possession would it always be a psychiatric diagnosis is it possible that both are at play at the same time you know did a person experience some type of demonic episode that caused the mind to fracture as a way to compensate and try to understand what was taking place so again that is such a very complex area which is why again why the catholic church turns to professionals in the mental health field helping us to make the distinction because if truly if one is dealing with a mental health issue they have a psychiatric diagnosis if medication helps the condition then that would be an indication that this truly is of a mental nature if it's truly of a demonic nature then the medication would have no effect whatsoever and have you seen that happen where someone who is legitimately demon-possessed was treated with all sorts of drugs and that never helped and then when you performed an exorcism it helped them immediately yes absolutely yep wow and some of the examples would be the former exorcist of indianapolis when he would go to the uh the mental hospital across the street from his parish to visit some of the residents there he believed that some of the residents were actually demon-possessed but because society didn't know what to do with them they were just classified as having some type of psychiatric diagnosis and placed in that institution the challenge would be that as a priest it's difficult for me to try to find people in the mental health field that are at least open to the possibility that this is something of a spiritual nature many of the people my experience in the mental health field would just immediately discount this as even a possibility yeah and don't you think that that that plays in the in the hand of the of the devil yeah like most people most people don't think that this is real and so they're not gonna go get checked out or consider as a serious possibility and so you might have this person just possessed their entire life when they could have been freed a long time ago yeah that that's a classic line from a the french poet bottle arrow the 17th century the devil's cleverest ruse is to convince us that he does not exist you know the devil doesn't really want to be out in the limelight he prefers to work in the shadows and on the fringes you know and you conquer people one by one and again if people don't believe that he exists then he can certainly just continue to work kind of under the radar so to speak all right let's get to some more questions from punchbowl haircut he says are there are there ways that demons afflict people without possessing them if so what are they and is there anything one can do to combat them so the catholic church would identify three other types of extraordinary demonic activity so we focused a lot on possession there could be demonic infestation the presence of evil in the location or associated with an object there can be demonic vexation so one is receiving physical attacks from a demon and there can be demonic obsession which are mental attacks from a demon so in my experience again one out of every 5 000 people may be a true case of demonic possession there are many cases that involve infestation where i'm asked to go and and offer a special prayer a blessing and a house or an office or some other location uh vexation praying with people that believe they're being physically attacked this would mean uh there would be bruises marks bites scratches one of the examples you might see in hollywood movies where incisions of letters will appear on a person's body for a period of time and then they'll they'll recede that would be an example of demonic vexation demonic obsession a person has persistent thoughts of evil that go through their mind meaning every experience is filtered through the presence of the devil or some demon somebody gets fixated on believing they see the number 666 everywhere they start believing that they're hearing noises you know that the devil is out to get them that type of thing i will say that i believe that demonic obsession is the most difficult type of extraordinary demonic activity to deal with even more difficult than demonic possession itself because in demonic obsession again you're really trying to pull apart what is truly something of a psychiatric nature and what something of a spiritual nature and that can get so complicated because again is it always something demonic is it always something psychiatric or are the two at play at the same time so just trying to pull that apart can be very very very difficult but ultimately you know anybody that turns to the church you know even though an exorcism may not be called for or may not be called for right away simply to pray with the person to pray with somebody because ultimately an exorcism at its very core is a special prayer it's a prayer asking god to bring relief into the life of the person who is suffering okay let's get to another question from jeff he says could a demon leave the possession on their own could something like drinking inhabitate someone to allow demon possession only for a time so when one is possessed it doesn't necessarily mean that the demon is manifesting all the time to be possessed means that someone has created an entry point for the demonic in their life so there's a connection now between that person as an individual and some evil spirit and so the connection is there but it doesn't mean that the manifestation always takes place it is possible that someone who is demon-possessed doesn't necessarily need the right of exorcism just through growing in holiness and virtue they could uh help eradicate that on their own so if somebody is demon possessed again they're not manifesting all the time they could have a desire to turn to god to have a relationship with christ and in doing so simply by growing in holiness and virtue that connection between the individual and the demon could come to an end so the intervention of an exorcist is not always called for all right question from cliff wilson he says what does father lampert think of the movie deliver us from evil has he seen it i have not seen that particular movie i don't know if anyone if you can comment on that or give me some background into that but i'm not familiar with that what exorcism movie have you seen obviously the exorcist the one that came out in the 1970s the exorcism of emily rose the movie the right so do they get anything right in those movies the exorcism of emily rose actually is uh pretty authentic when it comes to the manifestations of evil and how the church combats that so they're not that far off again the church focuses on what god is doing even though most people are always interested in the manifestations but a lot of things are true to form interesting okay another question from benjamin vance he says how often do you think ghost stories etc are actually demonic is there such a thing as a ghost or is it either imagined or denim or demonic i believe that 99 percent of the time when people say they're encountering some type of a ghost that it's a an evil spirit one percent of the time it might be the soul of one who has died but it's important to note that once we die we cannot choose to continue to act in this reality god has to permit that to happen for whatever reason god may have so god would have to allow that to happen and it may simply be that the spirit of the one who has died god is permitting to manifest to bring some type of comfort into a loved one who's grieving the loss of a loved one who's died i knew a lady one time whose grandson had died and she shared with me that for like five days straight he would visit her every night and sit on the end of the bed and talk with her and she told me that after the fifth night he told her that he had to go on he couldn't come back anymore but he had to go where god wanted him to be so in that case we would say that that was a particular grace that god permitted for whatever reason god had to bring some type of relief or sense of peace in the life of this lady who was grieving the loss of her grandson all right here's a question and this the name of this you this youtube account is one of the funniest i've seen he says morgan freeman's favorite freckle all right he said he says have you ever experienced a case where a demon behaved like a normal person so as to fool those around it yes i have one of those one of the exorcisms in rome so in rome i was able to participate in 40 exorcisms and uh how long were you there three months three months in for 40 exorcisms in three months well the priest did more than that he was well known in rome but during the time i was there i was on a sabbatical program so that was the amount of time that i had to go and be with him two or three days a week he literally would have 50 or 60 people at a time gathered in a courtyard outside of his office some had appointments some didn't they were just hoping to get an opportunity to visit with him but in one of those exorcisms the demon stopped manifesting and it gave the impression that the consciousness of the individuals now backed was now back and uh father carmine the priest who trained me he was aware that he was trying to be duped because the person's voice was their own that sounded like their voice and said i'm okay now thank you for what you've done for me the demon is now gone there's no need for you to continue to pray you can stop praying now you can stop praying i said you could stop praying and then father carmine reached over and took some holy water and blessed the person again and then the demon manifested and goes i told you to stop praying so he knew that the demon was trying to deceive him into believing that it had been cast out and i think exorcist over time the more you do the ministry you gain more knowledge about whether or not true deliverance has taken place at a particular time or not wow all right question from joe sharp jesus said this kind does not go out except by prayer and fasting why is this so and have you experienced this that is true jesus did say that the disciples came back from going out and doing ministry and the question was asked why could they not cast a particular demon out and jesus says this kind can only be cast out by prayer and fasting so one who does an exorcism needs to prepare themselves so as a catholic priest the church says that i should prepare myself by spending time in prayer i should fast i would celebrate mass i would go to confession spend time in prayer so i have to prepare myself because again the exorcist is a minister of christ so we're bringing the presence of christ to one who is afflicted by the evil one and so it is that presence of christ that we want to bring if we're bringing our own presence full of sinfulness and everything else then we're certainly not going to be effective in combating the evil that's present in the life of a person so again prayer and fasting are disciplines of the church that allow the exorcist to be truly disposed to carry out this particular ministry i'm noticing in the live chat that people are talking about harry potter would you say that harry potter is okay for a christian to watch or does it involve things would it open someone to demon possession people have to realize that certain types of literature like harry potter are categorical in nature so they're trying to teach something such that eve that magic is not evil i i believe that all magic is inherently evil and i don't mean an illusionist somebody who's making doing a card trick or pulling a rabbit out of a hat that's an illusionist but true magic at its core is inherently evil so i think certain books like harry potter are trying to present evil as something good and what's interesting about it is that many young people today will pick up a book on magic or harry potter book but when's the last time they picked up the bible so my response today would be can you just tell young people not to read these books probably not but i think people who read them need to filter that through their christian faith so if you're going to read these types of books or watch the movies then you should be able to filter them through your faith and to say this is why this is or is not consistent with my christian faith so it could be a teaching moment for parents and their children so children are watching the movies or reading the books to be able to sit down with them and say let's look at this through the lens of our christian faith and our relationship with christ and say why is this consistent or inconsistent all right just a couple more questions from andrew owen he says what happens to a person's soul if they die while possessed well the person's soul always remains free and when someone dies because the connection is physical then that connection will come to an end so something of the person always remains free sometimes people will say if one is possessed how could they ask for help well again the part that remains free can't ask for the help of the church and if somebody dies then certainly the connection between that person and the demon will will end as well all right question from carl hannah he says it seems like in luke's yeah it seems like in luke 9 49 christ is giving the office of exorcism even to those who are not accompanying accompanying christ and his disciples what is your view on this passage father vince i think that's the clear indication again that as long as somebody is operating within the using the power and the authority of the name of jesus christ again it goes back to what i said earlier the uh the catholic church does not have a monopoly on the practice of exorcism and it's christ himself who's doing the exorcism through the minister or through the person who truly believes one of the analogies that i like to use is that you know think of a room that's and you know i don't know infested by cockroaches if you walk into the room and turn on the light what happens to the roaches they start crawling for every crooked crevice so in an exorcism what is the light that's being turned on is the light of jesus christ which is causing the demons to flee so as long as someone again using that reference to luke 9 49 if someone is operating under the authority and the power of christ they have that level of faith then certainly uh an exorcism could take place all right question from gina m i think i pulled up the wrong one here i tried to pull up gina's let's see there we go i actually did want to pull up skeptical mantis's question i'll do that next all right from gina m he says she says how do you deal with cases where the person alleged to be possessed is a minor are there more procedures or is it more difficult what are your thoughts so by a minor i'm not sure what age but the catholic church would say that no one under the age of reason which is the age of seven could bring on demonic possession on their own so god would always protect and safeguard anyone under the age of reason anyone over the age of reason then they're culpable for their own actions so if one is a minor under the age of reason then someone else must bear the responsibility for exposing that child to the demonic it can be more complicated in dealing with minors because again you're working with the parents with the parents of the guardian of the child trying to understand what took place so it can't be more complicated but again the parent or guardian is the one who's taking the lead because certainly a minor on his or her own can't ask to church for help they may not even fully understand what is taking place and if one is a minor if the parent or guardian is requesting exorcism prayers from the church then they can be performed okay so here's the question that i mentioned earlier that i accidentally pulled up and here it is skeptical mantis says i'm an atheist but i do enjoy some music with quote unquote satanic themes i don't believe in demons or the devil but if it was real why haven't i been haunted or negatively affected i would say that the demon has nothing to gain from that if if the person doesn't believe in the devil or evil spirits then the devil would have them exactly where he wants them to be in disbelief so it would be the case you know is the devil going to attack somebody that's [Music] really devout or unbelief you could say that if the devil has already won somebody over then there's really no reason to attack them the devil is going to go after those he still stands to gain something from and i don't mean that to be negative or critical of somebody who's an atheist that's just my perspective on that that if the person really doesn't believe then the devil has nothing to gain from that person because if the devil were to scare them then that fear might lead them into a relationship with god and certainly the devil wouldn't want that so i would say the devil is happy with the person where they are it's interesting all right from cliff wilson he follows up he says thank you cam and father lampert the movie deliver us from evil is a true story about a cop who who called in an exorcist yeah so i know that both check that one out i will say that um i know priest that uh and myself included we've been consulted by authorities who walk into situations that are pretty horrific and in graphic i had a police department here in indiana that there was a a sign that went up on a highway and they couldn't understand it but it was a satanic sign and looking at it and talking as colleagues of mine it was determined that somebody who was a member of this satanic group wanted to leave the group so they put up the sign threatening to harm them if they revealed any of the secrets of the group to anyone outside of that group and there was all kind of satanic symbols and whatnot in this particular sign so the cops were trying to understand that there's a priest in italy who uh works with the the italian state police in investigating uh satanic ritual crimes so skeptical mantis just posted a comment he said so if you want to stay safe from demons i guess just become an atheist you might be safe in this life but uh watch out in the life to come [Laughter] eternity is forever yeah uh yeah something to think about skeptical mantis okay um let's let's go ahead and close this one out so i really appreciate you coming out maybe both the maybe you and i can watch this movie what was it i forget what it was called i shouldn't have forgotten evil deliver us from evil maybe you and i both can watch that movie and then we can do a follow-up interview where we talk about this movie or it might be fun to just do a a talk about some of these hollywood makes of these movies about exorcisms and kind of pick things out that are they're interesting that might be that might be something fun to do well in any case thank you so much for coming on it's been really really like i said the even with the book it was very very informative if you've never talked to an or heard an actual exorcist discuss some of these things it you there's a lot of myths out there there's a lot of misinformation it's a lot of caricatures of what it's like and what it is some people don't believe in it at all and i'm sure that even after this interview a lot of skeptics are going to remain skeptics but either in in any case it's been very informed it's been very fun great interview thank you so much for coming on yes my pleasure you're welcome all right and definitely we'll have to figure something else out in the future as well so let me talk to the audience real quick thank you guys for tuning in today if you'd like to support this ministry you can head over to patreon.com i always pull up the wrong screen excuse me patreon.com capturingchristianity the link to that is in the description of this video you can support the ministry for as much as you like i'll put up the the screen one more time the bereans is a private facebook group for patrons we have a lot of fun in that group i'm constantly posting things in there just for brands bereans and we we just have a really good time in there it's a it's a really fun close-knit community of people who are all super interested in apologetics and we love all of the stuff that we talk about on the channel philosophy apologetics theology we have great discussions there five dollars a month gets you access to that we also have a lot of other cool things on our patreon so just go check it out if you find value in the stuff that i do here you want to support me and my family and my work then again patreon.com capturing christianity is the way to do it thank you in advance for considering that if you haven't done that if you if you don't if you don't have the money but you still want to support subscribing to the channel is just a really easy and free way to do that and also make sure that you're subscribing only if you're really interested in the content don't just subscribe to subscribe because then it's actually going to hurt the analytics and stuff on our channel so only subscribe if you really like the content um yeah with that said christianity is true see you guys later [Music] so [Music] you

Channel: Capturing Christianity

Views: 739,257

Rating: 4.8278308 out of 5

Keywords:

Id: nhhi7Fk3ueI

Length: 61min 40sec (3700 seconds)

Published: Thu Oct 22 2020