If anyone has ever harbored a shred of doubt that Satan does exist, listen to Father Vincent Lampert or any trained Catholic exorcist for a few minutes, and those feelings will quickly disappear.
The faithful in the Diocese of Columbus will have that opportunity when Father Lampert, the exorcist for the Archdiocese of Indianapolis, presents “Exorcism: The Battle against Satan and His Demons” on Friday, Oct. 28 at Gahanna St. Matthew the Apostle Church.
The evening begins with confessions in the church from 6 to 6:45 p.m. Father Lampert’s talk will start at 7 p.m., followed by questions and discussion from 7:50 to 8:30 p.m. The event is free and open to the public and includes pizza in the St. Anthony Room from 6 to 6:45 p.m.
Father Lampert, 59, was ordained to the priesthood in 1991 and appointed by former Indianapolis Archbishop Daniel Buechlein as the archdiocese’s exorcist in 2005. He also serves as the pastor of St. Peter and St. Michael the Archangel churches in Brookville, Indiana, near the Indiana-Ohio border about 17 miles west of Oxford, Ohio.
Seventeen years ago, Father Lampert got the job when the archdiocese’s exorcist died.
“I was a pastor of a parish and really never dreamed that one day I was going to inherit the job,” Father Lampert said. “My bishop selected me, and so I didn’t volunteer.
“He told me he wanted a priest who believed in the reality of evil and not one who was too quick to believe that everyone who reached out to me was actually dealing with extraordinary demonic activity. And he said, ‘You don’t want the job, and that’s why you’re getting it because I would be worried about anybody who would want the job.’”
At that time, there was no prescribed exorcism school for priests. Father Lampert was sent to Rome for three months to be trained along with Father Gabriele Amorth, who went on to become the official exorcist for the Diocese of Rome, in an apprenticeship under Father Candido Amantini, a Passionist priest who did exorcisms on the Holy Stairs near the Basilica of St. John Lateran in Rome.
“There was also a Franciscan priest who allowed me to sit in on about 40 exorcisms that he performed while I was there, and I was able to learn firsthand,” Father Lampert recounted. “That’s what the Church says is the best way to become an exorcist, because you can do all the reading and studying you want, but it’s actually hands-on that teaches you what to do or what not to do.”
Since then, the Pope Leo XIII Institute was established at the University of St. Mary of the Lake Seminary in Mundelein, Illinois, as a ministry under the auspices of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops to provide priestly formation, education and evangelization regarding the Church’s teaching on exorcism, healing and deliverance.
Father Lampert has become known nationally for his work and often receives requests for help from outside his archdiocese. But he noted that every diocese technically has one exorcist, who is the bishop by virtue of his episcopal ordination.
In the Diocese of Columbus, Bishop Earl Fernandes has trained as an exorcist, but most local bishops designate one or more priests in their diocese to serve in that ministry.
“Because I’m publicly known, I get about 70 emails and phone calls a week,” Father Lampert said. “When I was appointed, my bishop didn’t just want me to do the ministry in the Archdiocese of Indianapolis, but he also wanted me to help educate people.
“Honestly, I can’t work with everyone who reaches out to me, but I tried to connect them either with somebody in their local diocese or their local area. I always tell people the best thing to do is to reach out to their priests.
“Like when you’re sick you go see your general doctor, then you could be referred to a specialist.”
There are cases when Father Lampert might work with an individual who’s outside his diocese initially and then refer them for ongoing spiritual direction to a priest closer to the person’s home.
Interestingly, he said half the people who contact him are not Catholic. Some come from other faith traditions. Some have no faith.
“It’s usually their pastors who tell them to reach out to the Catholic Church,” he said. “Catholics have a well-organized way of addressing the demonic.
“And then I think there is just that perception out there that the Catholic Church can help you if you’re dealing with the devil. Look at all these movies and things on TV that are depicting the priests who are front and center helping someone who’s afflicted.”
More times than not, the people seeking help are asking for prayer and spiritual guidance rather than an exorcism.
If there is cause to believe someone might be possessed, an exorcist conducts an extensive evaluation.
“Cases of demonic possession are extremely rare,” Father Lampert explained. “Maybe one out of every 5,000 cases.
“People can be dealing with some other forms of extraordinary demonic activity like demonic infestation, the presence of evil in a location; vexation, where somebody is being physically attacked; obsession, where someone’s being mentally attacked. Those cases, there’s thousands of those I would deal with on an annual basis.”
In those instances, Father Lampert instructs parish priests that they can take care of an infestation, for example, by going to bless a house. He often sends prayers and offers advice to clergy on how to handle specific issues.
“There are a lot of these situations where you can do blessings or prayers or things that can help individuals,” he said.
In his years as an exorcist, the priest estimates he has done 20 exorcisms that involve demonic possession, an average of about one a year, which is more than most exorcists, he says, because he’s known throughout the United States.
“I know other exorcists across the country, and they haven’t even had one case in like five years,” he said.
In the extreme cases of possession, exorcists in the U.S. follow protocols that start with a psychological evaluation followed by a physical examination from a family doctor. Then there’s an intake questionnaire trying to determine if the activity is demonic.
Step three involves determining possible demonic activity, such as the ability to speak and understand languages otherwise unknown to an individual; having superhuman strength; having elevated perception, meaning the person knows things that they should not otherwise know, which could be a sign that a demon is speaking and not that person.
Step four is a negative reaction to something of a religious nature, such as being blessed with holy water, being shown a crucifix and having the Bible read. Step five, considered the most important, is to normalize the person’s spiritual life.
“It’s not enough just to cast evil out,” Father Lampert said. “God has to be invited in.”
Thankfully, Father Lampert says that, in every case, he has experienced success with an individual.
“Sometimes exorcisms have to be repeated over a period of time,” he said. “But each prayer session does provide some spiritual relief even if it doesn’t cast out the demon at that particular time because, ultimately, God will determine the time and the place when the demon will be cast out.”
In instances that include demonic activity, the extraction of the evil one often resembles what might be depicted in a movie. But because the devil can be tricky, Father Lampert has witnessed situations where demons give the false impression that they’ve left a person when, in fact, they’ve not done so.
“What I’ve noticed is that just before the demon comes out, there’s like a shriek or scream,” Father Lampert described. “It’s like the stories that we hear in the Bible.
“And then, literally, there’s a glow about the person. And the best way I can describe it would be to think of a halo around the painting of the saints. They’re not radiating their own glory. They’re radiating the glory of God. And I witness that whenever someone has a demon expelled from them.”
These experiences remind the world that the devil isn’t just a movie character, and that hell does exist.
“A lot of people today might say that evil is nothing more than humanity’s inhumane treatment of one another that’s something of our own making and it’s not personified,” Father Lampert said. “And yet Church teaching has been consistent that the devil is personified and a concrete reality.”
Pope St. Paul VI presented Church teaching about Satan in 1972 during a series of Wednesday Angelus talks in which he said the devil shouldn’t be downplayed.
The antidote to evil, Father Lampert stressed, is prayer and the sacraments. He recommends the prayer to St. Michael the Archangel and a prayer to St. Joseph that became popular during the Year of St. Joseph in 2021.
“There are a lot of other prayers that people might just start to think that they have to say every day,” he said, “and I think the danger with that would be that people just focus too much on the devil.
“I think it’s healthier to look to the sacramental life of the Church, go to confession and go to ask for the anointing (of the sick).”
He recommends seeking spiritual guidance and learning more about spiritual warfare in books from Father Chad Ripperger, who serves in the Archdiocese of Denver, and others.
“Obviously, with somebody who’s dealing with the demonic, they must have opened the doorway for the demonic into their lives by some type of sinful behaviors,” Father Lampert said. “So that person definitely can go to confession. And any exorcist will tell you that a good confession is better than an exorcism prayer because it has sacramental grace that comes with it.
“When we confess our sins, we place them in the hands of God. And once we give them over to God, the devil cannot use that against us.”
For more details on Father Lampert’s upcoming local presentation, visit https://www.stmatthew.net/events/exorcist.
