Report: Exorcists Reply to Jesuit Head Who Said Satan Is Not a Person: Satan is real

[mdgspencer]

https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/exorcists-to-jesuit-head-satan-is-real-45628

The head of the Jesuit order made headlines earlier this week when he said that “the devil exists as a symbolic reality, not as a personal reality.”

He said that he devil “exists as the personification of evil in different structures, but not in persons, because is not a person, is a way of acting evil. He is not a person like a human person. It is a way of evil to be present in human life.”

The International Association of Exorcists felt it important to reply to him. Citing a long history of Church teaching on the nature of Satan, including several citations from Pope Francis and his recent predecessors, they said that Catholics are bound to believe that Satan is a real and personal being, a fallen angel.

The Jesuit’s remarks are grave and confusing, the exorcists said.

They said the existence of Satan is a truth of Christian doctrine.

 

[Bon_Croix]

I’m pretty sure it was a teaching of Pharisee Judaism as well.

 

[commenter]

If current trends continue, there will be more working exorcists than Jesuits in a few years.

 

[Jimbo]

I touched on this in another post.

Sometimes I wish it felt more like the Jesuits were in the same boat rowing the same way.

My Dad went to a Jesuit university and had nothing but good things to say about them.

 

[commenter]

Sometimes I wish it felt more like the Jesuits were in the same boat rowing the same way.

My Dad went to a Jesuit university and had nothing but good things to say about them.

Following WW2, the Jesuits were encouraged to cautiously scrutinize the culture, understand the dominant trends in order to engage the culture, for Christ. Apparently a solid core of future leaders was engaged by the secular culture, and used their position to “evangelize” the rest of the Order, to the secular trends (liberation theology, New Age Spirituality, etc).

Over time, conservative Jesuits were isolated, some left, most died without being replaced. There are exceptions in my area, who certainly would agree with the Exorcists, but they were nudged out of positions of influence.

The Order now focuses on molding young men to be social workers, community organizers, experts in civic responsibility - follow the media.
But you don’t need to be a priest or brother to do that, so their vocations in North America are one third of needed replacement rate for deaths and departures.

 

[halogirl]

I’ve had more than one priest insinuate that it’s something symbolic and I would honestly say that this is probably the most dangerous thing the church faces. If your troops don’t recognise the enemy you are weakened

 

[njlisa]

He is not a person like a human person.

@mdgspencer

No, Satan isn’t a “person like a human person.”
He’s a fallen angel.

If we don’t accept the biblical teachings about the devil, then we have to reject Our Lord’s confrontations with the devil and his demons.

Deciding that the devil “exists as the personification of evil in different structures” seems like a lot of intellectual hooey.

People are responsible for a lot of evil in this world. But we are fools to deny that the adversary and his minions are at work in the world.

@halogirl: Exactly.

I’ve had more than one priest insinuate that it’s something symbolic and I would honestly say that this is probably the most dangerous thing the church faces. If your troops don’t recognise the enemy you are weakened.

 

[esieffe]

Kind of makes you wonder what other things he thinks are just symbols.

 

[Jimbo]

That is super unfortunate.

 

[Dolphin]

There is nothing the devils wants more than for us to say he is not real

 

[commenter]

Kind of makes you wonder what other things he thinks are just symbols.

True. Reading some of the Order’s recent position statements, I wonder what passing trends from today’s secular media are regarded as permanent, eternal realities, if not dogmas.