7 Exorcism tips from Holy Souls Hermitage – More on terminology: Major and Minor

From time to time you’ll see the terms “major” and “minor” thrown about by major or minor ecclesiastics regarding exorcism. There has been a great deal of confusion about this for the past 150 years or so. Clarity is a good thing when dealing with Satan. Some don’t want clarity because they want to break the law of the Church and just do what they want. This is common in the field of exorcism. Disobedience is exactly what is not needed for exorcism, but this is where one will find plenty of disobedience, real belligerence.

In summary: If it is a direct command to Satan in the name of Jesus, it is a true imprecatory exorcism for which an express mandate is needed from the local ordinary. If it is not a direct command to Satan in the name of Jesus, it is not an exorcism per se, though it can be called a deprecatory exorcism or intercessory exorcism, though that is not very precise language and only confuses the issues. One doesn’t need any permission to prayer to God for someone.

Those who want to muddy the waters almost always want to do true exorcisms even though they have no permission from the local Ordinary, even though they are not priests. These disobedient souls insist that only a “major”, “public”, “ancient”, “lengthy”, “printed and therefore official”, “Latin as opposed to ‘mere’ vernacular”, “‘serious’ as opposed to what happens in the prayer group” kind of exorcism is what is forbidden to them. They say that they can give direct commands to Satan, holding their hands over all and sundry, as long as, in their opinion, what they are doing is “minor”, “private”, “modern, even of their own composition”, “short”, “oral or at least unofficial in that it has not been put through a process of approval”, “vernacular”, “not so serious, just in a prayer group” kind of thing. This is ludicrous and plays right into the hands of Satan. I have seen such people become very bitter against Church authority, making themselves into saviors of the Church, granting themselves and authority over Satan that they cannot have, and which Satan knows they cannot have.

Feeding into this kind of thing were the sometimes given titles of “Major” or “Minor” exorcism, but this had nothing to do with permission given to all and sundry to use what was called “minor”. Far from it.

There is a historical reason for all this, with the rise of various christian sects which encouraged practicing displays of charismatic gifts, sects which were imitated by some Catholics. They claimed that their gifts included being able to exorcize demons apart from the authority of the Church. This was, admittedly, a terribly difficult time, when a vast majority of bishops absolutely would not appoint any exorcists. Extremely few were to do so after Vatican II. The charismatic crowd felt they therefore had the right to fill in the void left by such true lack of pastoral solicitude. They had the right to request help, but they did not have the right to usurp the authority of any (Arch)Bishop. Some were, in fact, nervous about their disobedience, and set out to rationalize their activity with the sort of word games mentioned above.

Satan is not impressed with word games. He’s better at them. He will trounce the disobedient.