The author of the “Exorcist” William Peter Blatty and one of the instigators behind a push to make Georgetown University more Catholic has published a new book about how his son, who died young of a rare heart disorder in 2006 has been communicating with him from beyond the grave. In an interview touting the book with the Washington Post, Blatty talks positively about reincarnation and says he no longer believes possession is from fallen angels but deceased humans who are behaving badly.
It’s a q and a format:
Do you entertain the possibility of reincarnation?
Personally, I do. In the very early Catholic Church there were sects who definitely believed in the transmigration of souls. I’ve read a great deal about it. And maybe there’s something in my own life that tends to convince me it’s a possibility.
Who might that be?
Oh, God, then I have to name names. There is one person in my greater family who I’m convinced probably — let’s make that very probably — is a case of reincarnation.
And then this:
“The Exorcist” put forward the notion of evil incarnate.
I have moved away from the belief in fallen angels to the belief that demons are, in fact, spirits of the dead who are behaving very, very badly. In fact, in all of the possession literature since the beginning of the 20th century, most cases involve the spirit of someone who has died.
I bring this up, not to excoriate an 87 year old man who’s been through a terrible loss but I think it’s important in that Blatty, who is one of the more famous Catholics because of his book “The Exorcist”, was one of the loudest voices pushing for Georgetown to become more Catholic.
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