© Agence France-PresseFather Rufus Pereira, Roman Catholic priest and exorcist appointed by Pope John Paul II, preaches in 2009. Vampires, the devil's deceit and mental illness are among the hot topics for some 300 exorcists who flocked to Poland this week from as far away as Africa and India for a week-long congress.
Held at Poland's Roman Catholic Jasna Gora monastery, home to the venerated Black Madonna icon, this year's congress "examines the current fashion for vampirism in Europe and the world-over, schizophrenia and other mental disorders as well as the devil's deceit during exorcism," according to the monastery's radio station.
Also attending are "priests and lay people who work with exorcists or who are themselves practitioners in cases which do not involve possession but rather other forms of harassment by evil spirits," Polish exorcist, Father Andrzej Grefkowicz was quoted as saying.
Hailing from India, world-renowned exorcist Father Rufus Pereira as well as chief exorcist of the Archdiocese of Vienna Larry Hogan are among the participants, the radio reported. The unusual meeting is held once every two years.
The Jasna Gora monastery's venerated Black Madonna icon is believed by many Poles to work miracles.
Legend has it that it was painted by the apostle Saint Luke on a table top from the home of the Holy Family, according to the Jasna Gora website. Records suggest the icon arrived in Poland during the 14th century.
With around 90 percent of the population declaring themselves Roman Catholic, Poland remains one of Europe's most devout countries.
As, meanwhile, it has been exposed as enabling pedophiliac priests in many countries, and has been forced to pay millions in compensation to victims, who mostly were children at the time they were molested.
The Catholic Church vow of celibacy for priests and nuns is a travesty that's observed more in the breach than faithfully, by many in service to the church heirarchy and its orders. Most priests and nuns might be faithful to their vows, but the ones who are not have sullied the religion.
It's high time for the Catholic Church to capitulate on the matter of celibacy, for both men and women who sign up in its employment.
The other thing clearly hasn't been working. Let the priests marry! And look closely at the ones who choose not to marry. Let them even marry other men, if that's their thing, and the same for nuns. But weed out the pedophiles, or the victim lawsuits will be crippling.
Anyway, as to exorcism. It's appropriate for the Catholic Church to be involved, if and only if, it is somehow implicated in the pathology of the mental aberrations involved in any particular individual case.
Everyone, and I mean *every one*, has the potential to flip out and act badly, slip into madness. It is only when some specific religous ideation is involved that exorcism becomes a possibly appropriate response in attempting to affect remediation, if not an outright cure.
However, exorcism is such a small and odd issue that it's irrelevant.
The Catholic Church needs to fix its problem with pedophile priests, and the only way it can do that is do drop its vow of celibacy for all its employees, stop hiring pedophiles and other dangerous nuts and get real. But that is not likely to happen within my lifetime, or yours. Maybe in 500 years or so....