Le ministère de délivrance

Beware of Deliverance Ministries

It is almost impossible to be involved in healing ministry and not encounter situations where there is a need for deliverance. We have been given authority over evil by the power of the Holy Spirit. Thus, it is vital that we Christians and ministers of prayer understand what this aspect consists of in order to serve effectively.

First, we need to understand the difference between deliverance and exorcism. Early in the history of the Church, a lay person could pray for deliverance. This is what we do and teach at CHM, since we primarily teach lay ministers involved in healing ministry. Deliverance is a process of freeing a person from the influence of an evil spirit.

Exorcism is a little different. The word “exorcism” means “to hunt” in Greek. In the Roman Catholic and Episcopal Churches, an exorcism is a more formal act performed by a priest specially commissioned by his bishop. Exorcism is performed on a possessed person, and this must be proven. Possession means that the person has been totally taken over by satan, that the person no longer has a will of his own. As you read in Francis' article on the front page, in all his years of ministry, he only met one person he believed to be possessed.

Discernment is needed to know precisely which areas of a person's life are being targeted, the sources or root causes and entry points of a particular demonic influence or attack as well as the channels of a such affliction. Discernment is especially needed to know if a person needs medical or psychiatric care rather than deliverance, or if it is some kind of occult control or ancestral influence, or if there is a connection with a new religious movement, or a connection with a dubious alternative medicine, or even if there may be an infestation of a building or place, etc.

The process of deliverance becomes even faster and more certain if there is a possibility of what is called "inner healing". It involves discovering the root cause of the emotional disturbances that often open a person up to demonic disturbances. Inner healing also removes the blockages of a lack of repentance, lack of forgiveness and lack of renunciation.

Although only priests officially designated as “exorcists” can deal with “possession” cases, we can all by virtue of our baptism pray for deliverance for ourselves and in simple cases for our family members or friends. . But there are those, priests and laity, who seem to have a particular charism of prayer for deliverance, which is discerned by the fruits of their success and by their sober and balanced approach, which requires confirmation by the community and the Church.

Due to the nature of this demanding but necessary ministry, those involved should pray for their protection and that of their families. They must be humble, compassionate, fearless, prayerful, knowledgeable, careful and wise, working in teams, even including psychiatrists, and under the authority of the Church.

The promotion of such a continuous and systematic ministry of deliverance within the local church is and should be an integral part of the new evangelization in the new millennium, especially today when, as the Observatore warns us Romano from the Vatican, Satanism in all its forms and through all modern means of communication is emerging.