The main Catholic exorcist, Father Gabriel Amorth, who died in 2016, said that in 30 years he met the devil 60 thousand times. The book by his colleague Marcello Stanzione "The Devil Fears Me" describes exorcisms conducted by a priest and signs of possession, according to the Daily Mail.
The exorcist claimed that he once encountered Satan in the morning of 1997 when a young Italian was brought to his office in Rome. Amorth noted that the possessed knew only his own language, but the spirit within him spoke excellent English. The priest began a banishment session and demanded that the devil give his name. “He was shocked when he was told that the spirit is Lucifer himself,” the newspaper writes. When the exorcist ordered Lucifer to leave the Italian, the young man's body tensed, rose above the floor for several minutes, and then collapsed into a chair. After that, Satan admitted his defeat and named the exact day and hour when he would leave, Amort said.
Father Amorth became an exorcist apprentice in 1986, and in 1990 he founded the International Association of Exorcists. At first he conducted seances in the Church of the Holy Stairs, then he moved to the headquarters of his order. According to Stanzione, Amorth was famous for his sense of humor. “Amorta’s favorite joke was,“Do you know why the devil runs away when he sees me? Because I'm uglier than him,”the memoir says.
The exorcist admitted that many of those who came to his sessions had mental problems that a psychologist was best at handling. At the same time, he named several "symptoms" of obsession - headaches, stomach cramps, which can easily be confused with a common illness. The priest said that the devil hates Latin and prefers to speak English, even if the possessed person does not know the language.
According to Amort, 90 percent of the possessed are Satanists, or people who are addicted to witchcraft sessions. In addition, he noted that the devil often possesses middle-aged women who have a weakness for fortune-telling.
Exorcism sessions are in great demand in the Vatican. In February 2018, it was reported that because of this, a special course on exorcism would be held at the Pontifical University Regina Apostolorum in Rome.
The Vatican approved the exorcism in 2014. Then the Catholic Church officially recognized the existence of the International Association of Exorcists. The organization, led by Amort, who died in 2016, now has about 400 members, 240 of them from Italy.