Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind from how Stuff
Speaker 1: Works dot com. Hey, welcome to stuff to Blow your Mind.
Speaker 1: My name is Robert Lamb and I'm Julie Douglas. Julie.
Speaker 1: You know, the other day I was feeling, uh, feeling
Speaker 1: kind of like a bundle of nerves, and so after
Speaker 1: work I decided to to go to the local y
Speaker 1: c A and had an exorcism done. I've heard about
Speaker 1: this class. Yeah, yeah, you just go in as a priest.
Speaker 1: They just retry it in, pull the demon out of you.
Speaker 1: That's cos you know, you're angst and then wham, the
Speaker 1: rest of the evening you're just you know, carefree, laid back.
Speaker 1: Doesn't it end in laughter yoga? Well, laughter yoga's next door,
Speaker 1: but it's why so you can hear it. And it's
Speaker 1: kind of hard sometimes to figure out which classes which,
Speaker 1: Yeah is it exorcism, is it the laughter yoga? Is
Speaker 1: it the children's karate class? I don't know. It all
Speaker 1: kind of mills together. Yeah, yeah, well that's the wife
Speaker 1: for you. Yeah, but I jove exorcism. A lot of
Speaker 1: people arguing it's not quite to the point yet where
Speaker 1: you can go and take it at the y But
Speaker 1: there are a lot of folks getting the devil yanked
Speaker 1: out of him by various holy people. It's true. In
Speaker 1: a two thousand and five gallop pole, they found that
Speaker 1: of Americans believe that quote people on this earth are
Speaker 1: sometimes possessed by the devil unquote. And they didn't necessarily
Speaker 1: go and put this in their um straight up findings
Speaker 1: as they normally do, because they couldn't quite construe what
Speaker 1: that meant. The gallop pole was like, m do they
Speaker 1: mean metaphorically possessed by the devil? Do they truly think this?
Speaker 1: And yet there that figure stands. Yeah, I mean because
Speaker 1: you can say, like, well, hey, that that guitarist, he
Speaker 1: is a man possessed up there in the stage, But
Speaker 1: it doesn't mean you actually think that the Lord of
Speaker 1: Hell has inhabited his body to enable more creative guitar playing.
Speaker 1: You know. Yes, Um, that's my own personal thing when
Speaker 1: I'm when I'm exercising myself out to be as a bulb.
Speaker 1: How do you exercise yourself? Do you like you have
Speaker 1: like a prerecorded video mirror mirror? But then you can't
Speaker 1: exercise yourself if you're possessed, Right, that's the devil exercising itself. Oh,
Speaker 1: I don't know, Robert. It seems to me like there
Speaker 1: are all sorts of rules here with this whole exorcism thing,
Speaker 1: which we'll talk about in a little bit. But um,
Speaker 1: but I think that's piqued our interests because it actually
Speaker 1: has been on the rise exorcisms. Yeah, and you know,
Speaker 1: we're at heart of science podcasts, so obviously we're not
Speaker 1: going to be We're not asking the question are these
Speaker 1: people really being possessed by demonic creatures from other planes
Speaker 1: of existence? I'm just gonna go ahead and say, no,
Speaker 1: that's not actually happening. But but that doesn't mean that
Speaker 1: what's happening isn't real in in some senses, and isn't
Speaker 1: really fascinating you to try and figure out, Yeah, why
Speaker 1: someone would think they were possessed or another person would
Speaker 1: tag that person is being in the same that we've
Speaker 1: we've talked about alien abduction encounters, and you know, we're
Speaker 1: pretty sure on the fact that and we definitely approached
Speaker 1: the topic from the standpoint of no, they're not being
Speaker 1: abducted by extraterrestrials and probed upon. But but what is
Speaker 1: going on is interesting in terms of of their of
Speaker 1: what's going on in their brain, how they're interpreting it,
Speaker 1: how they're weaving it into their worldview. And there's some
Speaker 1: similar stuff to discuss with exorcism. Yeah, and so we'll
Speaker 1: be talking about that, We'll be talking about why it's
Speaker 1: on the rise, We'll talk about what Mother Teresa has
Speaker 1: to do with it, and why they can actually be really,
Speaker 1: really dangerous. Yeah, and there's a as far as exorcism
Speaker 1: goes again, ancient rights of exorcism exist in various cultures
Speaker 1: throughout the world. It basically comes down to ideas that
Speaker 1: there is an evil foreign force, spirit, a demon um
Speaker 1: they're you know, various versions of this have inhabited somebody's
Speaker 1: body and it needs to be removed, either sucked out
Speaker 1: or banished um dependent by somebody who is holy. Now,
Speaker 1: most people are pretty familiar with the with of course,
Speaker 1: the movie The Exorcist or some of these more recent
Speaker 1: exorcism movies that have made the rounds, and that's a
Speaker 1: very you know, iconic vision of the the Catholic priest,
Speaker 1: you know, climbing up the stairs, going in and encountering
Speaker 1: a possessed child and uh and having all these uh
Speaker 1: vomit and urine, which I call motherhood on a day
Speaker 1: to day basis. That's right, that's just what I call it.
Speaker 1: As male priests are freaking out, you guys are just
Speaker 1: like Tuesday, right exactly. But yeah, I mean that is
Speaker 1: the thing that I think most people refer to, and
Speaker 1: it is a terrifying movie. Yeah, but not to get
Speaker 1: on a whole discussion of horror movies thing, but I
Speaker 1: actually think the most disturbing things in that movie are
Speaker 1: not the oh my goodness, look what that child is
Speaker 1: saying or doing. And I think there's some early like
Speaker 1: the early moments where like the child is referring to
Speaker 1: an imaginary friend or is making this little um I
Speaker 1: forget if it's like a little clay statue and it
Speaker 1: resembles the vaguely resembles this uh this ancient demon statue
Speaker 1: reference earlier in the film. Like, I think it's a
Speaker 1: great film, but I think the moments that work best
Speaker 1: or not those iconic crazy moments. No, no, well, and
Speaker 1: it is a good build up in the way it's
Speaker 1: filmed is really interesting. But yeah, yeah, but this is
Speaker 1: not a discussion Exorcist. Sorry, no, no, I mean, but
Speaker 1: we have to talk about it. It's huge in in
Speaker 1: our parlance when we talk about these types of things.
Speaker 1: But then there are there are various other cultures. UM
Speaker 1: will take uh to take Judaism for instance. UM in
Speaker 1: two thousand nine, just to just to give you just
Speaker 1: a taste of another world of exercism. Uh. In two
Speaker 1: thousand nine, uh Uh, famed Israeli master of the Kabbala,
Speaker 1: Rabbi uh Dovid Batsori, attempted to remove a debuck. Uh.
Speaker 1: It's like d y b b uk, which is which
Speaker 1: is another you know idea like I say, demons and
Speaker 1: evil spirit, cetera. He attempted to remove it from a
Speaker 1: Brazilian man via the internet, like via via Skype, which
Speaker 1: I which I really love because because we were talking
Speaker 1: about this yesterday when we were prepping for this, and
Speaker 1: and I was like, well, you know, people do um
Speaker 1: like hypnotherapy through Skype, So I wonder if people can
Speaker 1: do UM or at least you know, an attempt to
Speaker 1: do exorcism through Skype. It seems possible. And sure enough, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: and then you have this. That's the story that also
Speaker 1: mentioned the two fishmongers in a really orthodox orthodox suburb
Speaker 1: suburb of New York. They found a carp that was
Speaker 1: talking about the end of the world and it was
Speaker 1: singing yeah. And then what was There's some quote that
Speaker 1: said two men do not share the same dream, and
Speaker 1: so they both claim to have heard the carp speaking
Speaker 1: in another language saying the end is near. So that's
Speaker 1: what caused the fur because everybody's like, well, if two
Speaker 1: people witnessed this, then it must be true. Yeah one
Speaker 1: man singing are talking, that's just too yeah. Um. But
Speaker 1: but then you have various other cultures that are that
Speaker 1: are far removed from this. For instance, then in Bedouin tribes,
Speaker 1: there's this tradition of like that they're really big into
Speaker 1: the whole idea of the evil eye, like like somebody
Speaker 1: gives you that weird stare like a stranger. You know,
Speaker 1: we just caused No, no, well that's more like, yeah,
Speaker 1: because you have an evil stare. Um. But but that
Speaker 1: wasn't But but no, you get this evil stare, the
Speaker 1: evil eye, and suddenly it's like you know, and for
Speaker 1: us it just might kind of mess up your morning,
Speaker 1: like whoa, why was the dude on marta stare at
Speaker 1: me like that? But but in in some in bed
Speaker 1: Win tradition that means like you kind of got this curse,
Speaker 1: You've got this evil eye, and and you've gotta have
Speaker 1: it removed. And then a female healer would actually take
Speaker 1: it out of you and bring it into her. But
Speaker 1: she's got enough like holy protections going on and she
Speaker 1: can handle it. Yeah, she's probably got some other rituals. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so you mean they're very all these different purging rituals. Um.
Speaker 1: You know, they're involving everything from like salt water too, uh,
Speaker 1: into rolling people up and runs and kind of beating
Speaker 1: them with sticks kind of a thing. Um, just about
Speaker 1: any way you could possibly imagine trying to coax a
Speaker 1: demon out of somebody it's been trying. The latter one
Speaker 1: is the one that I said sounded like boor at. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but you do. You find it in all different cultures
Speaker 1: of religions um, Islam, Hinduism, but we mostly think of
Speaker 1: it in the Roman Catholic Church. And they define um
Speaker 1: a sort of possession to look like something like this,
Speaker 1: where you're speaking in a language that the person has
Speaker 1: never learned. Uh. There's an extraordinary show of strength, a
Speaker 1: sudden aversion to spiritual things like holy water or the
Speaker 1: name of God and severe sleeplessness, lack of appetite, and cutting,
Speaker 1: scratching and biting the skin. Okay, so those are sort
Speaker 1: of the hallmarks that that Roman Catholicism looks for in
Speaker 1: terms of possession. Um. And of course, with Worth's worth
Speaker 1: noting that none of those things are are super natural.
Speaker 1: You know, it's like anybody, anybody could could could have
Speaker 1: those symptoms if they just really wanted to do one
Speaker 1: more of their suffering. Well. And then also then we'll
Speaker 1: talk about this a little bit later, there's also the interpretation, right,
Speaker 1: so you how are you looking at the situation? What
Speaker 1: are you interpreting it as if someone is speaking in gobbledygook?
Speaker 1: Is that suddenly a language? Um? So there's that uh.
Speaker 1: And then there's the question of what does an exorcism
Speaker 1: look like according to the Roman Catholic Church, and for them,
Speaker 1: it's a twenty four page ritual based on prayers in
Speaker 1: which the priest invokes the name of Jesus, uses holy water,
Speaker 1: the cross, and can alter the prayer depending on the
Speaker 1: reaction that he gets from a possessed person. So it's
Speaker 1: kind of it's a manual of sorts, but it's also
Speaker 1: one of those things like Okay, hey, if they're not
Speaker 1: doing this, go to kin to three A and try
Speaker 1: this one. Y, Yeah, skip this and go forward. Um. So,
Speaker 1: in a person who claims to be possessed must be
Speaker 1: evaluated by doctors to rule out a mental or physical illness,
Speaker 1: according to Vatican guidelines issued in and Pope Benedict sixteen
Speaker 1: has supported wider use of exorcism in the Catholic Church
Speaker 1: as of late, like I believe the last five years
Speaker 1: or so, and this sort of wholesale return of Roman Catholicism,
Speaker 1: Catholicism back to its roots, so to speak. Okay, so
Speaker 1: there you go. That's that's what we're going to focus
Speaker 1: on today, is this sort of Roman Catholicism. Um. But
Speaker 1: also why people are submitting themselves to this practice. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's the thing, um, I mean, really, the more you
Speaker 1: look at it, you look at this, this ritual, this
Speaker 1: encounter between the person who either believes they have a
Speaker 1: demon in them or is told they have a demon
Speaker 1: in them, and in doing so, I think in many
Speaker 1: cases come to believe they have a demon in and
Speaker 1: the person sent to cleanse them off it the and
Speaker 1: generally we're talking about an authority figure of some kind
Speaker 1: at least in a spiritual sense. Yeah, and this is
Speaker 1: sort of a social role playing, right. You know, we
Speaker 1: talked about this a little bit, and you have a
Speaker 1: very interesting take on this, which is particularly in earlier years,
Speaker 1: although it still happens now. If you are ashamed of
Speaker 1: something about yourself, right, and you can't quite square with
Speaker 1: the reality that you're living in, UM, then you might
Speaker 1: look at this part of yourself as part of your
Speaker 1: personality and think that it is part of this demonic
Speaker 1: possession because it's an easy way to sort of just
Speaker 1: sweep it away without having to actually deal with this
Speaker 1: part of your personality. Right. And this is what behavioral
Speaker 1: psychologists refer to as cognitive dissidents, which is termed originating
Speaker 1: the n and it's basically refers to the feeling of
Speaker 1: discomfort the results from holding to conflicting beliefs UM. And
Speaker 1: I think like the the most easily UM discussed example
Speaker 1: of this is in in some societies, you'll have somebody
Speaker 1: who has homosexual desires, but they live in a culture
Speaker 1: or a subculture that that tells them that this is
Speaker 1: not something that you that this is something you choose.
Speaker 1: You cannot naturally feel this way, so you're in a
Speaker 1: situation where you feel something, and you feel something real
Speaker 1: inside you, but the world around you is telling you
Speaker 1: that it cannot be. It cannot be a natural part
Speaker 1: of you. Know, So it's not a natural part of you.
Speaker 1: You need some sort of story to explain. It's some
Speaker 1: sort of some sort of way to to deal with
Speaker 1: that cognitive dissonance. Yeah, And typically your brain is going
Speaker 1: to deal with it in one of three ways. One,
Speaker 1: you may try to change one or more of your
Speaker 1: behaviors or beliefs, um. Two, you may try to acquire
Speaker 1: new information or beliefs to increase the consonants, which will
Speaker 1: lessen the overall dissonance. Right. So whatever part of the
Speaker 1: part that's making you uncomfortable, it could perhaps lessen that. Again,
Speaker 1: this is a good example of well that the double
Speaker 1: made me do it, right Yeah. Um. Three, you could
Speaker 1: forget or downplay the importance of the cognition that's butting
Speaker 1: up against the contradictory cognition. So when we're talking about
Speaker 1: this exercist and really sort of falls into that second category. So, okay,
Speaker 1: if it's not if I can't explain this this sexual
Speaker 1: preference that I have, which is really butting up against
Speaker 1: this um religion that I subscribed to. Then it must
Speaker 1: be this outside force acting on which is sort of interesting. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and I guess it's the kind of thing kind of
Speaker 1: takes uh. I mean just yeah, the the idea of
Speaker 1: the devil, Uh, it kind of goes goes back to
Speaker 1: that whole idea that like the devil getting made me
Speaker 1: do it. You know, So suddenly there's something that's not
Speaker 1: really cool with you, Like maybe it's you know, it
Speaker 1: could be anything. It could be uh, you know, your
Speaker 1: your preference to to go out and have a drink
Speaker 1: every now and then, or or you know the fact
Speaker 1: that you're kind of a jerk sometimes you know, you
Speaker 1: can just explain it away and blame it on some
Speaker 1: external force that's not you, and you're like, well, hey,
Speaker 1: you know I And then you know, it takes the
Speaker 1: heat off of you. It's like I can't really help it.
Speaker 1: The devil actually made me do that, so right, and
Speaker 1: then you've got the whole social role playing right and um,
Speaker 1: as you've already noted that the extra this was completely
Speaker 1: iconic movie, you already have sort of a game plan
Speaker 1: here for how you're going to be possessed UM and
Speaker 1: through folklore, you know, two movies, there has been some
Speaker 1: sort of UM guidelines so to speak to how you're
Speaker 1: supposed to act. Right. It's kind of like the first
Speaker 1: time you're pulled over by a police officer. You know
Speaker 1: how it's gonna go because you've seen it happen and
Speaker 1: on TV shows and movies, magistration and license right exactly,
Speaker 1: UM or UM job interviews like that's another like classic,
Speaker 1: like you go in, you meet somebody and you go
Speaker 1: through these various exchanges. It's kind of like an exorcism, right.
Speaker 1: And then it's that you know, you encountering this figure,
Speaker 1: certain business is going to take place, and everyone pretty
Speaker 1: much knows how it goes. You're both playing a role, right.
Speaker 1: And so then you've got this social contract that you've
Speaker 1: entered into, right because you're trying to lessen the dissonance,
Speaker 1: and you say, okay, this must be this outside force.
Speaker 1: All right, now, I'm going to enter into this sort
Speaker 1: of confirmation bias world. And when I say confirmation bias,
Speaker 1: it basically means that you're gonna start to see patterns
Speaker 1: where there may not be any patterns. Um. This is
Speaker 1: from physicist Leonard Meledina's drunkards. Walk books quite interesting when
Speaker 1: he talks about confirmation bias. He says, when we are
Speaker 1: in the grasp of an illusion, or for that matter,
Speaker 1: whenever we have a new idea, instead of searching for
Speaker 1: ways to prove our ideas wrong, we usually attempt to
Speaker 1: prove them correct. Psychologists call this the confirmation bias, and
Speaker 1: it presents a major impediment to our ability to break
Speaker 1: free from the mist misinterpretation of randomness. So I bring
Speaker 1: this up just because if if someone again has this
Speaker 1: part of their their self that they might be ashamed of,
Speaker 1: or they have a mental illness, or um, they just
Speaker 1: might have something going on with themselves that they can't
Speaker 1: quite understand or pin down, then they could start to say, well,
Speaker 1: I have this feeling in myself and uh, you know,
Speaker 1: and I'm acting out in rage at times, and there
Speaker 1: are irregularities in my personality. This is starting to fit
Speaker 1: into possession, right. So it's very easy for the person
Speaker 1: to go down that road, and it's very easy for
Speaker 1: the person who is acting on that person as an
Speaker 1: exorcist to start to cobble together those details too. And
Speaker 1: this is I think really important too. And understanding the
Speaker 1: past and how exorcisms came to be because think about
Speaker 1: prior to UM, to neuroscience, to gosh, even like the
Speaker 1: nineteen seventies, if someone had a toddler, if they had
Speaker 1: night terrors, a parent could say, oh my god, my
Speaker 1: kid must be possessed because my kid is acting like
Speaker 1: she doesn't know me. She's spitting, she's biting, she's vomiting.
Speaker 1: You know, I don't know that vomiting actually happens with
Speaker 1: night terrors, but she's really upset, and people could easily
Speaker 1: misinterpret that for her being possessed. UM and she's seventeen
Speaker 1: fifty nine night terror. Yeah. So we're going to continue
Speaker 1: to discuss extitism, but first let's take this quick break.
Speaker 1: This presentation is brought to you by Intel Sponsors of Tomorrow,
Speaker 1: and we're back. It's it's worth it's worth stressing again though,
Speaker 1: the power of the role playing aspect of all of this,
Speaker 1: because I mean that encounter like it's such a I mean,
Speaker 1: it's it's such an ego stroke. You know that at
Speaker 1: a devil or the devil has inhabited me and it's
Speaker 1: responsible for my problems. And now I'm gonna go to
Speaker 1: somebody important and they're going to remove it from me,
Speaker 1: and I'm gonna start fresh, um, and we're all going
Speaker 1: to congratulate. Congratulate because the person who's doing it to
Speaker 1: you has all the power, and then saying, oh, look
Speaker 1: what I did, and you're saying, oh, thank you for vanquishing. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I actually I wasn't present for an exorcism, but I
Speaker 1: did like walk in on an exorcism once sort of
Speaker 1: like an acknowledge it. And then I was like okay,
Speaker 1: and then I walked in back into the next room.
Speaker 1: I should probably back up and explain you should we
Speaker 1: need Yeah. Uh So when I was in high school,
Speaker 1: I had a brief period of light where I was
Speaker 1: like really really into um into the church I was
Speaker 1: going to at the time, which was a small Southern
Speaker 1: Baptist church in in Tennessee. And uh well, I mean
Speaker 1: it was a fair sized church for a small town,
Speaker 1: but anyway, Southern Baptist church, and they would have this
Speaker 1: thing for the youth on on weekend evenings, like maybe
Speaker 1: it was like every Friday for a while or something.
Speaker 1: But they would have a coffee shop, you know, kind
Speaker 1: of like the old nineteen fifties Christian coffee shop. You know,
Speaker 1: they have live acoustic music and kids would have cappuccinos
Speaker 1: and stuff, and you know, and that's all well and good.
Speaker 1: You know, I would you know, I might go to
Speaker 1: something like that today. But but also we were like
Speaker 1: a lot of teenagers that were really into this, uh,
Speaker 1: this spirituality at the time and into what it into
Speaker 1: what it might mean and uh. And you know, teenagers
Speaker 1: think they're pretty important and they see the world they
Speaker 1: want to fight the man or or stand up and
Speaker 1: make a difference in the world. And so what better
Speaker 1: way than like dealing with the devil head on, which
Speaker 1: also plays into the whole angst, right, Yeah, the teenager's experience.
Speaker 1: Not to mention naval gazinglin why am I here? Yeah exactly?
Speaker 1: It like it, it plays into into all of that.
Speaker 1: So so I remember like exploring something like I remember
Speaker 1: going to a church we uh with a friend of mine.
Speaker 1: We went down to check out this church and in Huntsville, Alabama,
Speaker 1: and it was one of these where they would touch
Speaker 1: people and they would fall down, not healed, but laughing hysterically.
Speaker 1: Like everyone who was touched would fall down to laughing hysterically,
Speaker 1: and and it was really something to behold because it
Speaker 1: was you know, it was like this was the environment
Speaker 1: everyone was acting, and this was the social contract of
Speaker 1: this scenario where this man would would touch you and
Speaker 1: heal you and like in a hysterical sense, and you
Speaker 1: would you would fall down and then they'd come and
Speaker 1: cover you with a blanket. And so if if that
Speaker 1: is possible, then where you can where you can enter
Speaker 1: a social contract where a man's touch will bring ing
Speaker 1: out this you know, this total positive response in you,
Speaker 1: then it makes perfect sense that that the that that
Speaker 1: that you would have an exit, that the exorcism role
Speaker 1: playing scenario would work as well. But but anyway, so
Speaker 1: one night I was at the coffee shop and and
Speaker 1: my my friend there came up and he said, he said, hey, uh,
Speaker 1: you should come check out in the back room. We
Speaker 1: have we have this this guy and he has the
Speaker 1: devil in him. We're going to exercise him. And uh.
Speaker 1: And I was like, all right, you know, I'll check I'll,
Speaker 1: you know, i'll I'm interested in saying this. So I
Speaker 1: walked back there and sure enough, there's this guy, this
Speaker 1: other kid, you know, I don't know, he's like, you know,
Speaker 1: thirteen fourteen something like that, and uh, and he's just
Speaker 1: setting there kind of look looking kind of dejected, you know,
Speaker 1: like he's got some some heavy stuff on his mind.
Speaker 1: You know, he's not you know, strapped to a bed.
Speaker 1: He's not cursing and spitting or anything crazy. You know,
Speaker 1: he just looks like he's got some stuff he's dealing with.
Speaker 1: And uh. And so I was kind of like, okay, cool,
Speaker 1: I'll leave this to you guys. Um he took off.
Speaker 1: You're like, I'm not saying around for the Well, yeah,
Speaker 1: I don't know. I guess I felt like I probably
Speaker 1: didn't have much to offer. My exorcism skills weren't very
Speaker 1: good then and they haven't improved over the years. So um,
Speaker 1: so I was not going to be much help. So
Speaker 1: I just left them to carry it out. But it was,
Speaker 1: you know, it was kind of like I can easily
Speaker 1: imagine like a dude feeling like a teenager, feeling kind
Speaker 1: of depressed, like a lot of teenagers do. And uh.
Speaker 1: And you're in an environment where like, hey, this might
Speaker 1: be the problem and we can fix it, you know,
Speaker 1: why not why not engage in that situation? Well, and
Speaker 1: that's what I think is interesting about that scenario because
Speaker 1: it seems like a safe sort of scenario for a release, right,
Speaker 1: because that's what we're really talking about, whether or not
Speaker 1: you're being touched by someone and and made to laugh hysterically,
Speaker 1: or if if the devil is being vanished from you.
Speaker 1: It's sort of a metaphorical thing in these cases, right,
Speaker 1: And neither one is really that far from like just
Speaker 1: the the old fashioned come to Jesus, you know, thing
Speaker 1: like walk forward and be saved kind of a deal
Speaker 1: where you're calling on people like, hey, come try this out.
Speaker 1: It'll change your life. And then ultimately it's kind of
Speaker 1: well why not. All I have to do is walk
Speaker 1: down there and if it doesn't work, I'm out, you know,
Speaker 1: right right in this in this sense, it's really is
Speaker 1: very safe. It's a I've heard it referred to as
Speaker 1: like a proto psychotherapy session, you know. It's it's it's
Speaker 1: a bit of psychotherapy. You can get it out of
Speaker 1: your system, so to speak. Um, And I think again
Speaker 1: with with kids, it's really interesting because you do sort
Speaker 1: of you are dwelling in that that area of your
Speaker 1: imagination at that time and trying to work out a
Speaker 1: lot of the world's mysteries. At least I did, And
Speaker 1: you know, I mentioned to you that Dark Forces was
Speaker 1: a book series of my brother and I just consumed
Speaker 1: when I was very little and very little eight or
Speaker 1: ten or something, um, and was completely obsessed with with
Speaker 1: the occult and and all these different things. So I
Speaker 1: think it's a I think it's an interesting way to
Speaker 1: go about it. I think where it gets dangerous and
Speaker 1: problematic is when uh, exorcism is foisted upon people who
Speaker 1: don't really have a voice for themselves, and that can
Speaker 1: be kids and teenagers and certainly mentally folks. And they've
Speaker 1: been deaths. I mean, there's been like I was, I
Speaker 1: think I mentioned earlier how saltwater sometimes used. There have
Speaker 1: been people who have died from saltwater poisoning due to
Speaker 1: exorcisms people have I mean, it's you can do a
Speaker 1: Google news search and you'll find some rather harrowing results.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, yeah, there's there's a laundry list of of
Speaker 1: different ways that people have died, and unfortunately a lot
Speaker 1: of kids too, with the hands usually of their parents. UM.
Speaker 1: And of course the Catholic Church will tell you, okay,
Speaker 1: well we screen, but again it's up for interpretation. And
Speaker 1: in the earlier days, like in the seventies, I think
Speaker 1: they were looking for people who had epilepsy and saying, oh,
Speaker 1: well they must be epileptic. They don't worry there, you're
Speaker 1: not possessed. But there wasn't really a good understanding of
Speaker 1: mental illness or even something like Tourette Um. So you
Speaker 1: know if you if you had Tourette syndrome and like
Speaker 1: teen fifty you have, you know that you might be
Speaker 1: an atmosphere where that cultural script said that you were possessed.
Speaker 1: But I mean recently there have been deaths um. I
Speaker 1: think one of the most famous ones is annalyse Michelle.
Speaker 1: This is a twenty two year old German woman who
Speaker 1: died from starvation and dehydration and underwent sixty seven exorcisms
Speaker 1: over a year and a half period. Uh yeah, by
Speaker 1: the church, um I should add. And then there were
Speaker 1: Pentecostal ministers in San Francisco who pummeled a woman to
Speaker 1: death in nine as they tried to drive out her demons. Uh.
Speaker 1: In nineteen seventeen year old girl was suffocated by her
Speaker 1: mom with a plastic bag in effort to destroy the
Speaker 1: demon inside her. And most recently, a two year old
Speaker 1: died um in Fort Wayne, Indiana this year from an
Speaker 1: exorcism exorcism performed by his mother. And I won't go
Speaker 1: into details because it's terribly depressing. Sorry, sorry, but you know,
Speaker 1: I think it's important just to throw that out that, um,
Speaker 1: there has been an uptick in exorcism. So it's that's
Speaker 1: why I think you have to look at it as
Speaker 1: a whole and say, Okay, here's the metaphorical part, not
Speaker 1: not a problem. You know, kids working things out, um,
Speaker 1: people working things out for themselves on a metaphorical level.
Speaker 1: Here's the physical level where it can go way too far.
Speaker 1: And this cognitive dissonance really becomes a problem if you
Speaker 1: submit yourself to that level where you say, okay, I
Speaker 1: submit my mind in my body to this act um.
Speaker 1: And actually the uptaking exorcism is happening here in the
Speaker 1: United States and Poland, in Mexico as well, and in
Speaker 1: a November article in The New York Times called for
Speaker 1: Catholics interest and exorcism is revived. UH says priests say
Speaker 1: they're overwhelmed with requests for exorcisms in the US. Conferences
Speaker 1: have been held to prepare more priests and bishops for exorcisms. UM.
Speaker 1: A recent UH conference they had sixty six priests and
Speaker 1: fifty six bishops turn out, and the goal was for
Speaker 1: each diocese to have someone who could at least screen request.
Speaker 1: So the Catholic Church will say, though, that the purposes
Speaker 1: not necessarily to revive the practice, but to help Catholic
Speaker 1: clergy members learn how to distinguish who really needs an
Speaker 1: exorcism from who really needs a psychiatrist or pastoral care.
Speaker 1: M okay, which I still think, Okay, well, all that's interesting,
Speaker 1: and yet it does seem like a practice that is
Speaker 1: should have maybe gone away within the age of horse
Speaker 1: and buggies and uh. And then there's the whole point
Speaker 1: that Pope Benedict sixteenth has been returning to more sort
Speaker 1: of classical um, I guess ways of looking at the
Speaker 1: church and um and caring for its church members. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I guess I would. I would hope that most people
Speaker 1: that would come in seeking an exorcism would be it
Speaker 1: would would be advised to pursue various other treatments. It
Speaker 1: just seems I just I do hate to think of
Speaker 1: somebody with any kind of legitimate problem being referred to
Speaker 1: the exorcist. Yeah. Yeah, and this this art coal it said, um,
Speaker 1: this man by doctor Apple be a longtime observer of
Speaker 1: the bishop said, what they're trying to do in restoring
Speaker 1: exorcisms is to strengthen enhance what seems to be lost
Speaker 1: in the church, which is the sense that the church
Speaker 1: is not like any other institution. It's supernatural, and the
Speaker 1: key players in that our heart are the hierarchy and
Speaker 1: the priests who can be given the faculties of exorcism. So,
Speaker 1: you know, the syneca me says that it's just it's
Speaker 1: a it's a bit of a power thing. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: don't know. I can't get too into hole into them.
Speaker 1: I mean, I'm as discussing the past. I'm all open
Speaker 1: for like the you know, the positive aspects of various religions,
Speaker 1: you know, take take what you want and run with them.
Speaker 1: But I don't know, when you start throwing devils into
Speaker 1: the whole mix, it gets a little problematic in my opinion,
Speaker 1: it does. It doesn't. Like I said, for the metaphorical part,
Speaker 1: I'm all for that, this sort of like proto psychotherapy
Speaker 1: of hey, let's let's work this out with this part amount. Uh,
Speaker 1: But yeah, when it reaches the physical realm, it's a
Speaker 1: bit problematic. Um. Mother Teresa, did you know that she
Speaker 1: had an exorcism performed on her. This was late in life, right, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: she underwent an exorcism after a bout of insomnia was
Speaker 1: blamed on the devil, so says the Archbishop of Calcutta,
Speaker 1: Henry Sebastian Disusa, who happened to be in the hospital
Speaker 1: with her at the same time. And she would had
Speaker 1: been admitted for heart problems before her death in September,
Speaker 1: And so when doctors couldn't find a medical reason for
Speaker 1: her sleeplessness, he thought that she was being attacked by
Speaker 1: the devil and he wanted her to calm down, and
Speaker 1: so he went to her and said, would you like
Speaker 1: to have an exorcism performed on you? And she said, okay, sure.
Speaker 1: Well I guess there are two ways of looking to seither.
Speaker 1: This is outrageous because Mother Teresa was you know, great woman,
Speaker 1: did all this work, Beacon of light, beacon of light,
Speaker 1: you know, super holy. Why would she have to deal
Speaker 1: with this especially right, you know, right, why would the
Speaker 1: devil dog her now? But then also you could look
Speaker 1: at it, well, she's super you know, um hooked into
Speaker 1: all into the spiritual world. You know, she's like a
Speaker 1: So she's kind of like a computer running without firewalls
Speaker 1: or virus protection, and so if she gets one bad
Speaker 1: email in it could it could mess up the whole system.
Speaker 1: So yeah, yeah, and he claims that she she was
Speaker 1: fine afterward, and um, the all they did was a
Speaker 1: prayer of protection, So it wasn't like they were I
Speaker 1: imagine I wasn't there. I haven't read any accounts, but
Speaker 1: I would like to think that they were just sort
Speaker 1: of saying the prayer and not um not like for
Speaker 1: four hours screaming in her Yeah. Maybe maybe she got
Speaker 1: an abbreviated version. Yeah. Yeah. By the way, someone was
Speaker 1: standing over you for four hours screaming prayers in your face.
Speaker 1: Do you think you get so upset that you would vomit? Maybe?
Speaker 1: I mean I'm just saying like, this is when the
Speaker 1: hallmarks too, right. I mean I get kind of auntie
Speaker 1: if I have to set still for you know, over
Speaker 1: a half hour. So yeah, I imagine it would be
Speaker 1: pretty rough. Yeah. I'm just thinking about it because especially
Speaker 1: if the expercis wouldn't let me like check my my iPhone,
Speaker 1: and then I would be like, ah, this is the worst.
Speaker 1: Maybe I am possessed by the devil. I'm just thinking that,
Speaker 1: you know. I mean, it's certainly something that could get
Speaker 1: a person riled up and start behaving unusually, if if
Speaker 1: they didn't already have some sort of pre existing condition
Speaker 1: that would exacerbate that. But anyway, did you know also
Speaker 1: that the Pope has a chief exorcist? Oh? I bet
Speaker 1: he does. Yes, of course he does. Um. And his
Speaker 1: name is Father Kirila and Morth and he has carried
Speaker 1: out more than seventy thousand exorcisms in a career spanning
Speaker 1: twenty four years. Wow. Do you think there's ever like
Speaker 1: a big Vatican like Christmas party? And because I'm just thinking, like, uh, um,
Speaker 1: our friend guy, the Vatican astronomer and protector of that
Speaker 1: does he is the guy who protects the meteorite collection.
Speaker 1: I mean that maybe another dude, but all right, So
Speaker 1: so imagine the Christmas party where uh, for a guy
Speaker 1: walks up and then he runs into the the exercy.
Speaker 1: It's like, hey, guy, I'm in charge of keeping an
Speaker 1: eye on the cosmos for for for the Vatican, and
Speaker 1: you know, and these are my science credentials. What do
Speaker 1: you do? Well? I cast the devil out of people.
Speaker 1: You know, those guys are not gonna sit probably next
Speaker 1: to each other at the Christmas dinner. Like I can
Speaker 1: tell you that they probably whoever was planning the event
Speaker 1: was like, do not put these two together because this
Speaker 1: opposite ends the where the Catholic churches in modern time. Yeah,
Speaker 1: because they're like Father and MOR's going to start saying
Speaker 1: that this thing again, this, this is actually quite from
Speaker 1: We have cardinals who don't believe in Christ, bishops connected
Speaker 1: with demons. Then we have these stories of pedophilia. You
Speaker 1: can see the rot when we speak of Satan's smoke
Speaker 1: in the Holy rooms of the Vatican. So he feels like,
Speaker 1: I mean to him, like the Satan's around and this
Speaker 1: is the reason for all the horrible things that have
Speaker 1: happened to people in into the Roman Catholic Church. Yeah,
Speaker 1: well it certainly takes the heat off of people. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but definitely do not put consulmar me mis dude together. Yeah.
Speaker 1: All right, Well well that let's let's exercise some listener
Speaker 1: mail mail bag here, it's getting a little backed up.
Speaker 1: Let's get a little coffee. Yeah, we have one here
Speaker 1: from a listener by the name of Alicia and Alicia
Speaker 1: Wrightson and says I used to work in my college bookstore.
Speaker 1: One day we received some boxes with a funny word
Speaker 1: on him. I didn't know what the word meant until
Speaker 1: I opened a box and saw what was inside a
Speaker 1: blood pressure cuff. The word was and we take a
Speaker 1: shot at this vy gummm on the meter alright, like
Speaker 1: I'm am on a meter. Yeah, it's just the side
Speaker 1: of the word. Sent me into utter hysterics, and I
Speaker 1: was useless for a good half hour. Then I said
Speaker 1: it out loud, which got got the giggle started all
Speaker 1: over again. To this day, it remains the funniest word
Speaker 1: I've ever seen or said, and it can still make
Speaker 1: me giggle. Um. Keep up the great work with the podcast,
Speaker 1: and please check out my band The Wag at the
Speaker 1: Wag get banned dot com. Some of your HSW mates
Speaker 1: have our CD. There you go. Um, And then we
Speaker 1: have and I did check out that link to make
Speaker 1: sure it didn't like, actually go somewhere horrible. It does
Speaker 1: go to an actual fans website. All right, good good.
Speaker 1: I'm not just simply I'm not just gonna throw links
Speaker 1: out here. Um. We also heard from a listener by
Speaker 1: the name of Samuel Um and uh which Samuel. If
Speaker 1: I'm just to get into the whole devil thing. Again,
Speaker 1: Samuel means venom of God and it was like an
Speaker 1: old demon name the old is this venom and not poison? Yeah,
Speaker 1: poison of God, venom of God. I don't know anyway.
Speaker 1: That's like again in high school is really into all
Speaker 1: that stuff. So, but I don't have all the knowledge
Speaker 1: with me anymore. Anyway, Samuel the human not a demon,
Speaker 1: um wrote in had some very nice things to say,
Speaker 1: and then added at the end, I just listened to
Speaker 1: the podcast uh Religion in Space and Roberts saying something
Speaker 1: along the line with him loving idea of religion being
Speaker 1: carried into space in June really made me laugh, as
Speaker 1: I thought it would be the worst nightmare of Dawkins
Speaker 1: or someone like him. Also, I imagine that a religion
Speaker 1: developed for existence in space could be like Julie joked
Speaker 1: and revolve around checking valves and taking data the same
Speaker 1: way old religions like Christianity and Islam condemn eating shellfish
Speaker 1: and uh, and shellfish, which is a primitive lifestyle, can
Speaker 1: easily cause a disease if verage wrong way. Um, So anyway,
Speaker 1: that's interesting. Indeed, Yeah, there uh, there are a number
Speaker 1: of people who would who would get in quite a
Speaker 1: tizzy at the thought of of us taking religion in
Speaker 1: space as we as we discussed. Indeed, yeah, I thought
Speaker 1: the Dawkins part it was interesting as well. Um, yeah,
Speaker 1: he certainly probably would flip. Yeah. Um, so hey, uh,
Speaker 1: we would love to hear from you guys. Uh, your
Speaker 1: thoughts about previous podcasts, but also about this whole exorcism thing.
Speaker 1: What are your thoughts on it? Do you, like me,
Speaker 1: have any strange encounters with exorcism or or just kind
Speaker 1: of perplexing religious experience in the past. Uh, let us know.
Speaker 1: I'd love to hear what you have to say. Um
Speaker 1: and uh. And you can also find us on Facebook
Speaker 1: and Twitter. We are blow the Mind on both of
Speaker 1: those and we regularly update that with al sorts of
Speaker 1: cool links, updates about what our latest podcasts are and
Speaker 1: what we're planning to do in the future, and we
Speaker 1: take requests. I believe I believe this one was, like
Speaker 1: you said, it was requested by a few different people
Speaker 1: before we decided who wanted to say, why in the
Speaker 1: heck are there so many exorcisms? Yeah? What's up with
Speaker 1: these actives going on? Where can I get one? You
Speaker 1: can also email us at Blow the Mind at House
Speaker 1: to Fooks dot com. Be sure to check out our
Speaker 1: new video podcast, Stuff from the Future. Join House to
Speaker 1: Work staff as we explore the most promising and perplexing
Speaker 1: possibilities of tomorrow.