Vicenza, exorcism at the sanctuary: “Twenty-eight years old possessed by the devil” by Benedetta Centin for Corriere del Veneto
The young woman presented herself to the Madonna of Monte Berico and attacked a friar. Nine hour ritual. Father Rossato: “Hundreds of cases a year”. The Diocese: “Prudence”
She looked out to the confessor friar, in the “cell” in the basement of the Sanctuary of the Madonna di Monte Berico, and the 28-year-old from Vicenza was transformed: screams, blasphemies and rash phrases, pronounced with different voices and languages, including Latin , according to witnesses. Shocked, they left the penitentiary on Sunday morning, which was then evacuated and closed. There where they intervened, because called by some witnesses, policemen and ambulance, but remained outside the sanctuary . The woman, no longer in control, was a crazed splinter that wiggled, attacked anyone who approached, from the friar confessor to the mother he slapped. And it ran from side to side, even over the furniture .Victim of a curse, possessed by the devil according to the friars who blocked the woman with difficulty and, called the father exorcist of the sanctuary, subjected her to the rite to free her. An exorcism that lasted nine hours, from 11 to 20.30, with four friars also involved to give assistance , and another father from outside the region connected by videoconference. For her father and brother, the 28-year-old must have had psychiatric problems. “The key to salvation was the mother, the only one who understood that she was under the influence of the evil one” explains Father Carlo Rossato, prior of the friars of the order of the Servants of Mary who spoke on Sunday. « It was a real possession and it was only in the evening that the situation was resolved: the girl physically collapsed and was taken home “.
“Hundreds of cases and four exorcists”
The long ritual, however, may not have completely freed the 28-year-old entrusted to an exorcist from Verona. “The path of the prayer of liberation can last years and there is a lot of suffering” says Rossato, who describes the case as very demanding: ” It was not easy, but it is one among many, which can be mistaken for psychiatric reality : in the curia of Vicenza there are four exorcists to whom the bishop has entrusted the mandate. Always few compared to the hundreds of questions. And we are faced with a page of the Gospel – continues the friar -, only Jesus frees from the dominion of the evil one ». The Curia, on the other hand, is more cautious about the frequency . “The fact that the phenomena of diabolical possession are rare does not mean that they are impossible” says the spokesman Don Alessio Grazi ani. “What happened in Monte Berico seems to prove what the Church, starting from the experience of Jesus in the Gospels, has always maintained, namely the possibility in some rather rare cases of a direct intervention of the evil one”. Caution also in the “study” of cases. ” Before proceeding to the exorcism prayers, the psychological and psychiatric situation is carefully evaluated to see if the malaise or discomfort experienced can find other explanations – reports Don Alessio -. The Diocese therefore invites prudence in judgment and prayer ”.
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