Interview with Fr Gary Thomas of "The Rite"

Interview with Fr Gary Thomas, the priest on whose experience the film “The Rite” was based.

Leticia Velasquez

Catholic Media Review

Velasquez: I’d like to ask my first few questions about the book.

What did you first believe about Satan? How long had you been a priest and what was your belief?

Fr Gary: I was a priest for 27 years; I never doubted the existence of Satan. However, I don’t think I’d ever seen Satan until I became an exorcist. Like they say in the Creed. “All that is seen and unseen”. I had no reason to doubt Satan.

Velasquez: No doubt in your years as a priest you’ve seen his work, you just didn’t meet him. After you took the course in exorcism at the Regina Apostolorum, you had more of a change of experience than a change of belief then?

Fr Gary: Oh, I’d say so, absolutely, sure, because my belief in Satan and the existence of Satan, I just assumed there was a Satan, because the Church teaches about Satan and I thought it was true. Taking the course was very informative, but it wasn’t to much taking the course as being able to apprentice under an exorcist in Rome for three months, that was far more profound.

Velasquez: So that left you convinced that this was an important ministry within the Church?

Fr Gary: Absolutely. It’s a healing ministry, I think that should be underscored; it’s really a healing ministry. When you think of it that way then there isn’t so much of a provocation that somehow one has to think of it and A. be afraid, that B. think it is all smoke and mirrors. It’s a healing ministry.

Velasquez: What made you coordinate with Matt Baglio on the book?

Fr. Gary: Well, Matt was just taking the course in Rome like I was; I didn’t know him till we were in the course together. He was an American and we were the only two Americans in the class.

Velasquez: Were you helping each other with Italian?

Fr Gary: I wasn’t helping him with his Italian, because he’s very good with Italian, he’s married to an Italian. He was helping me with my Italian. He was so kind to translate the presentations for me. He would translate the presentations for me because the Regina Apostolorum didn’t always offer translator, however, I didn’t know that till I got there.

Matt and I would talk a lot, when I told him I was going to be there for a long time and I was looking to find an exorcist, and he asked me “would mind if I wrote a book about your experiences of your training?” I just kind of shrugged my shoulders and said, “OK, That’s fine if you want to.” I had no idea where this was going to lead, but I knew he was a journalist by profession. He spent hours interviewing me, especially when I was working with a priest in Rome.

Velasquez: And that Roman Capuchin exorcist is portrayed by Anthony Hopkins in the film as Fr Lucas?

Fr Gary: Yes. My character is played by Colin O’Donohue.

Velasquez: And he’s a seminarian rather than an experienced priest?

Fr Gary: That’s correct. The filmmaker did take a bit of license with that.

Velasquez: Did he play an Irish priest? He’s Irish, right?

Fr Gary: He is, but in the movie, you will not hear his brogue. He’s playing the role of a deacon, he’s been ordained already. He’s had a faith crisis, and he’s been having a faith crisis during every summer of his seminary formation, he realizes this after he is ordained a deacon. I think he just realizes that he’s made a mistake.

Velasquez: Do you think that the differences in the portrayal of the story affect the message?

Fr Gary: No, I don’t think so. I mean I watched the movie with Anthony Hopkins two weeks ago, I thought it was very riveting. It was very emotional for me, yes, they took some license, but the core message in that movie, and I think this is a movie about faith.

Velasquez: Its good to hear that because the book was very moving.

Fr Gary: The book is all true. There’s nothing in that book that’s not true.

Velasquez: So you think the movie is realistic. Unfortunately, the trailers are a bit sensationalistic.

Fr Gary: I know, the trailers don’t do the movie justice. I’ve had lots of my parishioners say, “Oh my Gosh, they look so scary”, but I tell them it’s not as scary as it looks.

Velasquez: Perhaps they chose the scary parts to attract an audience which might not be initially interested in the deeper message. I hope they do come and it works to get them in to see the film. What is the takeaway message of the film?

Fr Gary: I think the takeaway message is that its very important to have a faith life. And if you have that faith life, it will only lead to good. That evil does exist in the world and its bigger than just the force of a power. Its an intelligence. And in the same breath, Christ has come to be with us and get us through this life to the next.

Velasquez: Matt Baglio gave me the impression that you two were very devoted to spreading this message in the American Church.

Fr Gary: Oh yes.

Velasquez: You sent copies to all the bishops.
Fr Gary: When Doubleday published the book, the religion editor called me and said, “Do you have any suggestions for us?” I said, “Yes, send this book to every bishop in the United States, and every rector of every major seminary”.

Velasquez: What kind of reaction did you get from the bishops and rectors?

Fr Gary: I got some very nice thank you notes and some letters acknowledging that they got the book, I know the religion editor got probably more than I did, but I got about a dozen. They were all very positive. Now I will tell you in the same breath, that there are bishops who don’t believe. I’ve had rector generals tell me they don’t believe.

Velasquez: What percentage of diocese have exorcists?

Fr Gary: There are 185 dioceses in the country I know there are at least 25 public exorcists, I know there’s a few more. I’d say there’s probably under 50. So probably maybe a quarter of US dioceses have one.

Velasquez: Yet, isn’t that something the Church recommends for every diocese?
Fr Gary: The Church mandates it in the Code of Canon Law.
Velasquez: So we’re actually in violation of the Code. There was a meeting about exorcism before the USCCB general meeting in November. Do you think that sending the bishops a copy of “The Rite” had anything to do with it?

Fr Gary: I wouldn’t say in a profound way, but I would say Bishop Leprocki who is the head of the Canonical Affairs Committee of the USCCB, he had been to one of our conferences. We have a conference every year back in Chicago and its for exorcists and priests involved in the healing ministry and some lay people come too. He went to one of them. I don’t know if he got a copy of the book, although he should have, it came out in 2009 and he was already an ordinary. But he said he doesn’t remember receiving it. But he has since read it. I can’t say it didn’t have anything to do with it. I think the very fact that I wrote a cover letter to 185 bishops may have had an effect.  I hope it did.  But I do think that calling a conference and calling the bishops together should have been a wake up call for a lot of them. There were 65 bishops who signed up for that conference and 55 priests. I thought it was a very well done presentation myself.

Velasquez: Do you know Fr Thomas Euteneuer?

Fr Gary: I’ve met him, I don’t know him.
Velasquez: Have you read his book, “Exorcism and the Church Militant”?

Fr Gary: I’ve read parts of it.

Velasquez: Is it consonant with your experience?

Fr Gary: Yes, it is.

Velasquez: Do you have any stories to tell of exorcisms?

Fr Gary:  There was a situation in Rome once with a young woman who walked in speaking Italian to me, my exorcist trainer walked in and blessed her with holy water and she literally began screaming and picked up the chair, and was going to throw it at him. Now, they’re not all like that.

There’s the man I pray over and have been exorcising for two years, there’s huge manifestations, he’s improved dramatically, but, nonetheless, he opened himself up for a bunch of reasons. I can’t detail them on the phone, it would take too long. 

Velasquez: In general, what do you recommend people avoid if they don’t want to become involved with demonic activity?

Fr Gary: I think they should just stay away from everything that is pagan in the sense of ritual, so I recommend that people should stay away from dabbling in the occult; from dabbling in things that are idolatrous, from getting involved in things that are simply about self, and I don’t mean by that going to a club and doing physical exercise. Where people are into Wicca, earth worship of other kinds, witchcraft and spells, crystals, using metaphysical means to try and find answers to questions.

Velasquez: So stay away from New Age practices?

Fr Gary: Yes, those are all the New Age practices.

Velasquez:  I appreciate your influence upon the USCCB.

Fr Gary: I hope it has some enduring influence.

Velasquez: Is there any evidence that they are sending any more priests in for exorcism training?

Fr Gary: Well, we don’t have any training programs. I hope that is something which comes from the meeting in Baltimore, we have no training programs.  I was lucky to get the training I got in Rome, but as I said to the bishops, you can’t expect the exorcists in Rome to train all our exorcists. I have already oriented two guys in the last year; They’ve spent a few days with me. But it requires much more than that.

Velasquez: Do you think there’s a greater need now in the Church than in previous times?

Fr Gary: I do, because there’s more Catholics involved in more paganism and idolatry.

Velasquez: Fr Gabriel Amorth agrees with you, according to his books. Why do you think that there’s not enough of this ministry?

Fr Gary: I think for a long time we just relied so much on the social sciences, Psychiatry and Psychology as sort of a new religion to figure out the mysteries of human behavior. I think we felt we could just depend on science, and I certainly am a proponent of using Psychiatry and Psychology, but in the same breath, I think that there’s a limit to science and there’s the realm of the spiritual we know far less about. And because of our scientific mind and orientation as a Western society, I think we put these other kinds of things we can’t figure out on the shelf.

Velasquez: So its our prejudice against a spiritual explanation for things?

Fr Gary: I think so.
Velasquez: Thank you Father Gary.

Exorcist; the devil is in the Vatican

We know the devil is very active in Washington these days, as Catholic Pelosi lies about abortion funding in the health care bill, Catholic Bart Stupak is attacked as 'unamerican' for opposing it on that basis,  and the silence from the USCCB is deafening.
 Did you know that the Prince of Darkness is also active in the Vatican? If you read "Windswept House"by Fr Malachi Martin, which he claims was based on truth, before his mysterious murder, you would know that.
Fr Gabriel Amorth, chief exorcist of the Vatican who has written two books entitled,
"An Exorcist Tells His Story", the devil is apparent in the attempted murder of Pope John Paul II, the attack on Pope Benedict by a deranged woman over Christmas, and the pedophilia scandal.
I read a book a while ago about a secret Communist plan to send moles into the Catholic priesthood to destroy it from within. From some of the nonsense we have seen in some of our dioceses, I believe that someone wants the priesthood to fall, for it will take the Church down with it. And now there are new allegations of child abuse, involving Pope Benedict's brother, who slapped boys in the face while teaching school. While I wouldn't condone this, it was probably an accepted practice at the time.
Whats the solution? Exorcisms, according to Fr Amorth who was interviewed by ABC news here. However, author of the book, "The Rite" (see my review here) Matt Baglio is pessimistic, as he sent copies of his book to every bishop in the US to encourage them to appoint exorcists, only to be ignored in all but two cases. Fr Amorth has harsh words for such bishops,
 '"I believe bishops who don't appoint exorcists are committing a mortal sin,".

Time magazine discusses exorcisms

Exoricism is making a comeback in the Church, and this journalist investigated the Legion of Christ course on exorcism in Rome. He discussed with Time Magazine how the subject was treated by priests immediately after Vatican II and today. "
"You write about how most priests don't even like to talk about exorcism, that they find the idea distasteful. Why is that?There's a lot of taboo when it comes to the devil and evil itself. Parishioners don't want to hear about Satan and evil and sin. Father Gary, he's in his 50s, and he was ordained in the late '70s. During that period, you had a lot of turmoil in conjunction with Vatican II shaking up the church and getting rid of many very old traditions, the Latin mass and those sorts of things. But you have to look at priests themselves as being creatures of their environment. Coupled with that were all this these new psychoanalytical approaches that were uncovering a lot of things that in the past were considered to be in the realm of the spiritual. I think a lot of priests saw that and said, Let's just keep becoming more modern and more open and don't worry about all these "medieval things."
And as a result, many exorcists are marginalized within the church.I had priests tell me that their superiors belittled the fact that they were exorcists. Interestingly, though, the newer generation of priests are more responsive to the reality of the devil, and a lot of that has to do with the fact that John Paul II was and Pope Benedict XVI is a little more conservative, so the younger seminarians are a little less apt to ridicule. The older priests of Father Gary's generation didn't want to talk about it.
Read the entire story here.
HT National Catholic Register Blog

Yoga, Enneagrams and Reiki: portals for evils spirits to enter our lives

A British exorcist has warned against the "thin edge of the wedge" which is the dabbling in Eastern religious practices like Reiki, Yoga, acupuncture, etc which may give evil spirits a foothold in our lives. "According to Father Jeremy Davies, exorcist for the leader of Catholics in the UK, yoga puts people at risk from devils and the occult is closely associated with the scourges of "drugs, demonic music and pornography" which're "destroying millions of young people in our time"."
I have given my testimony in this post about my youthful involvement in the occult. I began doing seances in fourth grade on Girl Scout campouts, with mothers present who did not understand the dangers of the occult. Adoro Te Devote has an even more sobering testimony of the dangers of Tarot Cards here.
Read the entire story here.
HT New Oxford Review

Pope Benedict to increase number of exorcists

London, December 29 (ANI): The Vaticans chief exorcist, Father Gabriele Amorth, has revealed that Pope Benedict XVI is setting up exorcism squads to deal with the rampant growth of Satanism.
He says that the decision in this regard has been taken in the wake of rising concerns among Church chiefs over growing worldwide interest in Satanism and the occult.
According to him, each Bishop will be provided with a group of priests who are experts in fighting demonic possession. Hundreds of priests will be trained as exorcists for the purpose, he says.
You have to hunt high and low for a proper trained exorcist. Thanks be to God that we have a Pope who has decided to fight the Devil head on, the Sun quoted him as telling Catholic website Petrus.
Thanks be to God for a worthy shepherd, who sees such and urgent need and is willing to risk criticism to protect his flock from themselves.
HT Spirit Daily
UPDATE:
As Matthew said in comments, below, the Vatican is denying this here. I have hopes that it is true, and as often happens, the bad press causes certain bureacrats to try and do 'damage control', as when Pope John Paul said of "The Passion", "It is as it was". We certainly need an exorcist here on Long Island, we have for decades. Anyone see "The Amityville Horror"? It happened here.

Mexican Exorcist warns about the influence of Harry Potter

"The leading exorcist of Mexico's main archdiocese said the popular Harry Potter book and film series could allow the devil to enter children's minds, and does ''a lot of damage.''The Reverend Pedro Mendoza, a Roman Catholic priest and exorcist coordinator of the Archdiocese of Mexico City, made the comments at the end of a five-day exorcism conference in Mexico City.''If you put all these ideas in a child's head, that he can become a wizard, the child believes that, and that is opening an avenue through which the devil can get in,'' Mendoza said Friday - the eve of the release of the series' final book.He said that Harry Potter ''doesn't interest us,'' but ''unfortunately, it does a lot of damage.''
NDTV.com

My experience with the occult came as a result of the media fascination with the occult in the 1970's between The Exorcist, The Omen, The Amityville Horror, and, believe it or not, Bewitched. Sometimes, it's not so much what is in a particular film or book that is evil, but what that book leads innocent children to. In the case of the Harry Potter series, all you have to do is read the titles of other books which are included in the display in the bookstore where they are sold. All of them have to do with the occult. Harry Potter books serve as a jumping off point for children to explore the occult. Adolescent experts like Steve Wood call this a 'portal'. He told Johnette Benkovic that when police want to investigate a crime, they request library records of teens, and often such books are involved in the teen's downfall.
HT Colleen Hammond

Fr Gabriele Amorth on Medugorje

Don Gabriele Amorth is an exorcist in the diocese of Rome and the president of honour of the Association of Exorcists that he founded in 1990, and of which he was president until the year 2000. During his stay at Medjugorje in July 2002, he gave an interview to Fr. Dario Dodig.
Fr. Dario Dodig: Don Gabriele, you are exorcist in the diocese of Rome?
Don Gabriele Amorth: I am an exorcist in Rome and president of honour of the Association of Exorcists, which I founded. In the year 2000, we celebrated its 10th anniversary. I was 75 years old and I asked someone else to take over this duty. When Bishops are 75, they are retired, so I did the same!
Don Gabriele, would you be so kind as to tell us what is exorcism?
Exorcism is a public prayer of the Church done with the authority of the Church, because it is done by a priest named by the Bishop; it is a prayer for liberation from the demon, from the evil influence of the demon or of the evil provoked by the demon.
When we speak about exorcism, can you tell us how Satan can influence Christians?
The influence of Satan is immense. Satan acts in two different ways. The ordinary action of Satan is when Satan tempts men to evil. All men, from their birth to their death, are involved in this struggle against Satan who tempts them into evil. Jesus, because He had a human nature, submitted Himself to temptation coming from Satan. Except the ordinary action, Satan also acts in an extraordinary way, which consists in provoking malign troubles, which can go on until satanic possession.
When we speak about possession, how can we defend ourselves from Satan?
We have to first speak about prevention - what to do to avoid these evils. The measures of prevention are to live in the grace of God, to be faithful to prayer and not to do works that open the door to the demon, especially not to do any occult works. There are three main works of occultism: magic, spiritism and Satanism. The one who is dedicated to these things exposes himself to the extraordinary action of the demon.
Is the influence of Satan in the world of today stronger than before, especially his influence on the youth, for example through music?
Today, Satan has free hands. This does not mean that he has more power than in the past, but the door is wide open to him. Primarily, today we live in a period of little faith. It is purely mathematical: when faith declines, superstition grows. When we abandon God, we give ourselves to practices that open the door to Satan. There is no doubt that today’s media have done much in favour of Satan, first by the immorality of certain shows, the abundance of movies showing violence, horror or sex. Except this, media have put in the first plan and have given popularity to figures of wizards and magicians, and so they give publicity to their works.
Is the exorcism the highest degree of action against Satan? Are their other means that can come before this last degree?
Conversion! The first thing that we ask from people who come to us is to live in the grace of God, to be faithful to an intense sacramental life and to the life of prayer. After this, if it is necessary, we encourage them to receive prayers of healing and of deliverance, as they are practiced in the Catholic Charismatic Renewal. After a number of such prayers, the person is either already set free, or the need is evident to do the exorcism itself. Then we do the exorcism, keeping in mind that exorcism is a prayer where the result does not always come immediately. Sometimes, years of exorcism are needed for a person to be delivered.
Is the exorcism the highest form of action in the name of God?
Theoretically, yes. Nevertheless, we have to keep in mind other factors, which are very important before God. The exorcism is a prayer. Like all the prayers, it is the more efficacious the stronger the faith is. Faith has a fundamental importance. This is why we often read in the lives of saints that they have delivered people from diabolic possession without being exorcists themselves.
When we speak about Satan and satanic action, we usually have fear within us…
It is because we are not any more used to exorcism. Priests in general believe very little in the extraordinary action of Satan. If a bishop proposes to them to do the exorcism, they are frightened, as if they think: “If I leave the devil in peace, he will leave me in peace. If I fight him, he will attack me.” This is wrong. The more we fight Satan, the more he is afraid of us.
In her messages in Medjugorje, Our Lady says often that Satan is strong and she invites us to pray, to fast and to be converted.
Yes, this is true. In an Italian magazine, I had the occasion to comment on Our Lady’s messages where she speaks about Satan. She often spoke about this. She underlined that Satan is powerful and that he wants to destroy her plans. She invited us to pray, to pray, to pray.
In her messages, Our Lady spoke about the Rosary, about the Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament, about prayer before the Cross, and she said even that through prayer wars may be stopped.
Yes. Through prayer, we can even stop wars. I always understood Medjugorje as a continuation of Fatima. According to Our Lady’s words in Fatima, if we had prayed and fasted, there would not have been World War II. We have not listened to her and therefore there was a war. Also here in Medjugorje, Our Lady often calls to prayer for peace. In her apparitions, Our Lady always presents herself under another name to show the goal of her apparitions. At Lourdes, she presented herself as the Immaculate Conception, in Fatima as the Queen of the Holy Rosary. Here in Medjugorje, Our Lady presented herself as the Queen of Peace. We all remember the words “Mir, mir, mir” (peace, peace, peace) that were written in the sky at the very beginning of the apparitions. We see clearly that humanity is running the risk of war, and Our Lady insists on prayer and on Christian life to attain peace.
In her messages, the Queen of Peace also underlines fasting, which is a bit forgotten in the Church. She speaks about fasting according to what is written in the Gospels - that through fasting and prayer we can eliminate all influence of Satan.
This is true. First in Fatima and now here in Medjugorje, Our Lady speaks often about prayer and fasting. I think that this is very important, because contemporary men are following the spirit of consumerism. Humanity searches how to avoid any kind of sacrifice and so it exposes itself to sin. For Christian life, except prayer, we need a certain austerity of life. If there is no austerity of life, there is no perseverance in Christian life. I will give you an example - today, families fall so easily apart. They celebrate the wedding, but the couples divorce quickly. It happens because we are not used to sacrifice any more. In order to live together, we have to be able to also accept the deficiencies of others. The lack of spirit of sacrifice leads to the fact that we do not live Christian life in fullness. We see with what facility abortion is being committed, because of the lack of readiness to make a sacrifice to educate children. This is how the first reason of marriage is being destroyed. This is because there is no practice of making sacrifice. Only if we are used to sacrifice ourselves, we will be able to live Christian life.
The fruits of Medjugorje are numerous. Conversions are numerous. A theologian says that here, heaven came down on earth. Our Lady invites us to abandon ourselves totally to her so that she may lead us to Jesus. Isn’t this the essential for Christian life?
No doubt! Medjugorje is really a place where one learns to pray, but also to sacrifice oneself, where people are converted and change their lives. The influence of Medjugorje is worldwide. It is enough to think about how many prayer groups came about thanks to the inspiration of Medjugorje. I also lead a prayer group, which was founded in 1984. This group is already 18 years old. We live one afternoon as it is lived in Medjugorje. There are always 700 or 750 people. We always meditate on Our Lady’s message of the 25th of the month and I always read this message in relation to a sentence from the Gospel, because Our Lady does not say anything new. She invites us to do what Jesus thought us to do. Groups like mine exist all over the world.
Is it true that Medjugorje is a “big mouthful” for Satan?
Surely. Medjugorje is a fortress against Satan. Satan hates Medjugorje because it is a place of conversion, of prayer, of transformation of life.
Would you give us your advice?
The “testament” of Mary, her last words written in the Gospel, are “Do whatever he tells you”. Here in Medjugorje, Our Lady insists again that the laws of the Gospel are respected. The Eucharist is at the centre of all Medjugorje groups, because Our Lady always leads to Jesus. This is her main concern: to make us live the words of Jesus. This is what I wish to everyone. May the Immaculate intercede for you, so that the blessing of God may descend on all of you in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen!
Thank you, Father, and may God give you a long life!

The Exorcism of Emily Rose

OK, I admit it, I sometimes get a bit obsessed with a film, and see it a dozen times. My excuse is that I may write a screenplay someday, so I have to study technique. Few films stand up to this kind of scrutiny, besides the awesome Passion of the Christ.
The Exorcism of Emily Rose, however, is so well-crafted that it bears repeat viewings. Based upon the true story of Annliese Michel, a college student in Germany in 1976, it's based upon the trial of an exorcist priest who failed to save Emily from death, or the devil. The film is centered on the trial, with flashbacks providing windows into the terrifying case of a pious young woman besieged by several demons. Even more unsettling is the fate that befalls those who defend Fr. Moore and the film builds slowly into a stunning climax.
The Exorcism of Emily Rose has none of the gore of The Exorcist, but just as much drama, and leaves you without a definite answer to whether the devil exists, something to ponder in the days which follow. Especially at 3AM.