Friday, August 09, 2013
On
Exorcisms
You’ll find references to an exorcism I
attended if you check the blogs for December 2012. Writing about Sister Daphne
in the last foray into my biography reminded me of another one. (Memory is like
thousands of bags full of substance but which are tied at the neck to each
other so that you have a metaview, like a list of contents but have to untie
each neck to get at what is harboured there.)
As I said, I worked as a social worker in a
convent. We had about a dozen extremely emotionally disturbed adolescent girls,
twenty or so staff and used a technique called regression therapy to enormously
beneficial effect for most of them. Despite its efficacy it was never taken up
country-wide because of its sophistication and cost in terms of skilled staff
required. Anyway, imagine the premises we worked in on the convent estate. A
truly gothic, mullioned, slit windowed red brick building with turrets. Very
tall, particularly in morning and evening mist. Bedrooms along narrow
corridors. A chapel which frightened the girls, situated between their rooms
and my flat. Better than a thousand locks.
One girl came to us and Sister Daphne and
the head of the unit, Sister Rita, were soon perturbed by the girl’s smell. So were the other boarders.
Though she washed and had clean clothes she exuded something which made the
hair rise on the nape. She had a thin small voice coming from somewhere deep
within her overweight body. She seemed to look from a depth so deep in her
skull that you could not imagine its source. She heard voices.
One day we heard a noise that antennae told
us wasn’t right and raced into the kitchen just in time to disturb the girl
strangling another and thereby saving her life.
The priest to the convent at the time was
called Godwin, believe it or not. Because we were not equipped to deal with
psychopathy, the would-be strangler was moved to secure accommodation
elsewhere. There were those among the staff who swore that she was possessed.
Despite her leaving and much use of powerful cleaning products, her room retained
her otherworldly odour. Father Godwin conducted an exorcism of the room. The
smell disappeared. As girls left, so did its temporary history of succour to the malevolent.
Twitter: @profjacksanger
Labels: Exorcism. Mystery.
<< Home