The Pontiff met with the International Association of Exorcists, who inspired the Russell Crowe movie “The Pope’s Exorcist,” this month about terrifying rise in Satanism
Pope Leo XIV took a private meeting at the Vatican with a delegation of Catholic priests from the International Association of Exorcists, who warned the Pontiff of a terrifying rise in “occultism, esotericism, and Satanism” that should prompt an uptick in exorcism priests at every diocese in the world.
The delegation is headquartered in Rome and was founded by French exorcist, Father Rene Chenessau and Father Gabriele Amorth, an Italian. The priests are internationally revered by Catholics for their work dispelling demon. Russell Crowe played a character rooted in Amorth’s ministry in the 2023 film “The Pope’s Exorcist.”
Russell Crowe in The Pope’s Exorcist (Credit: Sony Pictures Entertainment)Credit: Sony Pictures
The delegation is now led by Monsignor Karel Orlita and Father Francesco Bamonte, a member of the Servants of the Immaculate Heart of Mary. The Catholic exorcists said in a statement that they discussed “the painful and increasingly widespread situation of people seriously disturbed by the extraordinary action of the devil as a result of frequenting occult sects,” with the Pope.
They requested that the Pope add “at least one or more,” trained exorcists to every diocese as a way to battle what they called “the great suffering that the extraordinary action of the devil entails for those who suffer it and the Church’s commitment to eliminate or at least to alleviate, in the name of Christ, this suffering, through the sacramental of exorcism.”
At the end of the meeting, according to the Vatican, Monsignor Orlita and Father Bamonte gave the Pope a metal image of Saint Michael the Archangel from the sanctuary of Monte Sant’Angelo, in the Gargano, as well as two copies—in Italian and in English—of the book Líneas guía para el ministerio del exorcismo, published by the association in 2019.
Pope Leo has acknowledged the work of trained Catholic exorcists “delicate” yet “most necessary,” encouraging priests “to live it both as a ministry of liberation and of consolation, accompanying the faithful truly possessed by the evil one with prayer and the invocation of Christ’s effective presence.”