SATAN PLACE
Washington exorcist fights tech-savvy demons, Spanish bishop possessed by love, and the Satanic Temple’s ‘sacramental’ abortions
TEXTING DEMONS
Catholic priest Monsignor Stephen Rossetti, 70, who claims to carry out up to 20 exorcisms a week in the Washington DC diocese, says that demons have now worked out how to send text messages to taunt people they have possessed, their families and priests attempting to exorcise them. He said: “We have had three cases in which demons have texted the team and or the family of the possessed person… Two of these cases were the most difficult cases we have had so far, and the third involved a pious family with priestly and religious vocations among the children.” According to Rossetti, all these cases involved “high value” targets and involved powerful senior demons. One message read “Her torments start now, priest... all night. We will make her bleed”, while another said, “We’re glad she’s away from you now”.
Rossetti says that while texting is a recent development, demons have a long history of interfering with technology, disrupting televisions and making lights flicker. He believes that demonic possessions have grown exponentially over the last 10 years and that the situation is getting steadily worse. There is no evidence that demons have got as far as having Instagram accounts, though. D.Star, 4 July 2021, 21 Sept 2021.
THE LAST TEMPTATION OF FATHER NOVELL
Xavier Novell, who in 2010, at the age of 41, became Spain’s youngest Catholic bishop, was seen as a rising star in the Church. As a result, his resignation with the Vatican’s approval in August caused some surprise. Novell, who was well known for his role as an exorcist and his support for “conversion therapy” for gay people, as well as for Catalan independence, cited “personal reasons” but did not give details.
However, the Spanish website Religión Digital discovered that he had left the Church as he was in a relationship with Silvia Caballol, a psychologist and erotic novelist best known for Satanically tinged titles such as The Hell of Gabriel’s Lust. Caballol is described by her publishers as a “dynamic and transgressive author [who] turns upside down our ideas of morality and ethics,” while the blurb for one book promises the reader “a journey into sadism, madness and lust and a struggle between good and evil, God and Satan with a plot to shake one’s values and religious beliefs.”
Novell had practised exorcisms for several years, and apparently it was his desire to study demonology that led him to meet and then become close to Caballol. Church colleagues said they believed he had been possessed by demons, with one saying this was “not a problem of celibacy but rather of infestation.” Church sources also claimed that Pope Francis himself had urged Novell to undergo an exorcism to free his troubled spirit, but Novell had refused to do so. The ex-bishop, who is apparently looking for a job as an agronomist in the Barcelona area, is quoted as saying: “I have fallen in love and want to do things properly.” BBC News, D. Telegraph, 7 Sept 2021.
SATANIC TEMPLE VERSUS TEXAS
Texas’s new abortion legislation, banning the procedure from six weeks after conception, which is before most pregnancies are detected, and allowing individuals to sue anyone who they believe has had an abortion after that, or even anyone who assisted someone to have one, has met with widespread opposition. The Salem-based Satanic Temple, an official, tax-exempt religion
(see FT331:4, 383:42
43), has claimed its members qualify for an exemption to the law as a faith-based organisation. Citing the federal Religious Freedom Restoration Act that allows Native Americans to use peyote for religious rituals, the Temple filed a legal letter with the Food and Drug Administration that claims its members should have access to abortion medication up to 24 weeks into a pregnancy for religious purposes. Their letter says “TST’s membership uses these products in a sacramental setting… Abortion Ritual is a sacrament which surrounds and includes the abortive act.” The Satanic Temple’s co-founder Lucien Greaves issued a statement saying: “I am sure Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton – who famously spends a good deal of his time composing press releases about Religious Liberty issues in other states – will be proud to see that Texas’s robust Religious Liberty laws, which he so vociferously champions, will prevent future Abortion Rituals from being interrupted by superfluous government restrictions meant only to shame and harass those seeking an abortion.”
The Temple, which is not connected to the similarly-inclined Church of Satan, claims to be “resolutely non-theistic” and “does not endorse supernatural (or “supernormal”) explanations”. On its website it states that its mission is “to encourage benevolence and empathy, reject tyrannical authority, advocate practical common sense, oppose injustice, and undertake noble pursuits.” Bostonglobe.com, 7 Sept
2021.