Was hack Malachi Martin just riding on the coattails of William Blatty?

Gotta love the solid gold VIP currency that magically obtains 110% intellectual assent and total submission from the conservative right-wing trad crowd whenever a headline appears that begins "An Exorcist says..."

An exorcist says you say eh? Here's my s.s. code, my credit card, and every ounce of my credulity! I'm going to forward this to A BILLION PEOPLE! As for what the Pope says - send him the Dubia!

LOL

You do know that an exorcist is nothing more, or less, than a priest who does the prayers of exorcism right? While there are psychological/mental/past-history-of-personal-sin factors that go into deciding the suitability of a priest to perform this role, an exorcist has no more extra "power", or special anything, than every single other priest.

When your sins are absolved in the sacrament of confession, you receive the same power of exorcism. It is the power of Christ, not of any merely human person. As for special insights "because the demons said this or that", for every exorcist there's a hundred other priests who could give you the same insights from all the stuff they hear in confession.

There are priests who have used the ritual of exorcism to commit sexual abuse, just as there are priests who have used the sacrament of confession to commit sexual abuse.

So yeah, the whole fetishistic wandering exorcist-celebrity thing...it's, uh, how does one say, ill-advised.