In defence of exorcism

Spectator

3 days ago

British politics and ghosts are subjects that rarely meet. Sometimes an MP or parliamentary aide might report a sighting of one of various spirits that inhabit the Palace of Westminster. It is said, for instance, that the ghost of the assassin John Bellingham haunts the Commons lobby at the spot where he gunned down Spencer Perceval. And last year the diary secretary to speaker Sir Lindsay Hoyle excited the tabloids with her claim that once, in one of parliament's side rooms, she felt a phantom dog nuzzling against her leg.
In general, though, politicians aren't preoccupied with the paranormal. One exception is David Bull, the former TV presenter of Most Haunted Live! and the new chairman of Reform UK. On Good Morning Britain earlier this month, he was asked by Richard Madeley whether he had ever seen a ghost. Not only did Bull admit to having driven with a ghost in the boot of his car, he also told how a poltergeist had taken hold of the celebrity medium, Derek Acorah, and tried to strangle him.
This story was retold the other week with sceptical merriment at The Spectator's weekly editorial meeting. Feeling that I should intervene in support of the supernatural, I confessed to the editor and his crew that I once hired someone to perform an exorcism at my house in Maida Vale. Merriment turned to suspiciously demonic laughter.
What were the supernatural events that led to my experience with exorcism? I am a heavy sleeper, but even I was occasionally woken by the banging of doors on the second floor. But not as much as friends who had to sleep in the guest room. They also reported sudden chills and apparitions.
The man I turned to for help was not a priest but a dowser. He was a big cheese in the British Society of Dowsers. He was not at all 'new age'; he looked and spoke like an accountant. He identified the spirit of a young girl crouching in the corner of the room and thought that she had probably been a prostitute. Villas built in Little Venice in the 19th century, often for mistresses, became brothels in the 1920s. The Warrington public house on Randolph Avenue, close by my home, was a famous house of ill repute. Some have suggested that the word 'randy' (lustful) derives from the location.
To release the ghost from her physic imprisonment, I was encouraged to knock a double door between two guest rooms at great expense. It worked. No more banging doors. I was so convinced by my dowser that when I later bought a pied-à-terre in Kensington Gardens Square, I got him to give it a psycho-spiritual once-over.
My account leaves one big unanswered question. Why did I believe so readily in the presence of a pesky ghost in my house? The answer is simple. I have previous experience of the supernatural. Some years earlier I was sitting in my apartment in Bombay when I was called to the telephone. A woman called Rita Rogers wanted to speak to me. She told me that my father, Frank, who had died some years earlier, was sending me a message. He wanted me to have his gold Rolex watch.
Not only had I never heard of Rita (who later became famous as the clairvoyant who gave advice to Princess Diana), nor she of me, but she could not have known about my father or his watch. I rang my mother, who told me that she had been meaning to give it to me. It was handed over. As communication from beyond the grave goes, it did make me wonder why my father had sent me such a humdrum message.
Despite my own supernatural experiences, I still find it difficult to take ghost stories seriously – even my own. As a historian and geopolitical analyst, I live in a world of facts, evidence and logic. When friends or acquaintances tell me about the time they saw a ghost, I pass it off as an amusing anecdote in which I only half-believe.
By contrast, for most of history society has taken this stuff very seriously. The best-known early account of exorcism took place at Gerasene, near the Sea of Galilee. Here Jesus met a lunatic possessed by demons (literally 'unclean spirits' in Greek) and asked his name. 'My name is Legion, for we aremany.' Legion begged Jesus to 'send us among the pigs'. The demons were duly despatched into a nearby herd of pigs, which rushed into a lake and drowned.
But exorcism predates Christianity. In the first millennium bc, shamans in Mesopotamia called asipu performed exorcisms. The Roman-Jewish historian Flavius Josephus recorded how a holy man called Eleazar called on King Solomon to draw demons out ofthe noses of victims. Meanwhile, demons in the Islamic world, jinn, have always been dealt with by exorcists called raqui.
In the West, the publication of De Exorcismis et Supplicationibus Quibusdam ('Of Exorcisms and Certain Supplications') in 1614 defined the practice of exorcism until minor adjustments were made in Vatican II. These changes stressed the connection between exorcism and baptism. It's a connection heavily emphasised in the Orthodox churches, which do exorcisms all the time. 'At every baptism we spit on Satan – literally,' one accomplished icon painter told me.
The practice of exorcism today is seen by some to be an archaic medieval hang-over. But Pope Francis in an interview warned against the 'spiritual lukewarmness' that left people open to 'diabolical possession'. According to Vatican News, the demand for exorcisms in Italy has tripled in recent years and annual requests exceed half a million. Some attribute this to an increased use of recreational drugs and psychiatric disorders.
In Britain, exorcisms are carried out by specially trained priests – in the Church of England there are 42, one for each diocese. And although they don't like to publicise it, NHS consultant psychiatrists have been known to work with exorcists (or 'deliverance ministers', as the C of E calls them) to treat patients with mental health problems.
The belief in ghosts is an important part of human history. And despite the sceptics, it still has a place in modern life. It would be a great subject for Reform's new chairman to get his teeth into.