An exorcist on tattoos.
The following is from Fr Z's blog.
[The contributor is an exorcist, whom I know and trust. Fr. Z]
Our bodies do not belong to us to mar according to our whims. St. Paul never tires of reminding us that we are temples of the Holy Spirit. Just as I ought not carve my initials in the wall of the Holy Sepulcher, so too, ought I not permanently mark my body. My body is not my property since I am not the author of it.
Tattoos, in their original usage, are a form of manifestation of allegiance to pagan deities. Paul tells us all that all the gods of the pagans are demons.
I have dealt with with people who thought they had innocuous tats on their bodies. When I asked one girl why the “t” in a word was an inverted Cross, she had no answer and was quite angry at the artist. She had no idea.
Sometimes tattoo artists have satanists curse the ink so that the bearer have a permanent malefice (demonic fortuna – something akin to an anti-sacramental, a physical object that bears a curse) in their body. Why do they do this? A proclivity to malice, for certain; but also so that they can earn brownie points from Satan for the amount of people they can infect.
When I decommission tattoos, I use the formula from the Roman Ritual for “Reconciliation of a Profaned Church”, altering the words where appropriate. I paint over it with exorcised oil, using a Q-tip. Sometimes they scream as if I were skinning them alive. Sometimes it just hurts a bit. Often they feel nothing.
I know an ex-nun who got some ink. When I did a mental exorcism of the tattoo (She wasn’t looking at me and didn’t know what I was doing in my mind) she jolted. Upon telling her that she was compromised thanks to the tattoo, she then told me that she had all the nuns in her former convent get ink from the same guy. All of them left the convent within 6 months.
I deal with this stuff all the time. Some of the suffering that has resulted from it is quite sad. Onthe other hand, the worst part of tattoos is that they offend the One Who made our bodies and owns them.
[The contributor is an exorcist, whom I know and trust. Fr. Z]
Our bodies do not belong to us to mar according to our whims. St. Paul never tires of reminding us that we are temples of the Holy Spirit. Just as I ought not carve my initials in the wall of the Holy Sepulcher, so too, ought I not permanently mark my body. My body is not my property since I am not the author of it.
Tattoos, in their original usage, are a form of manifestation of allegiance to pagan deities. Paul tells us all that all the gods of the pagans are demons.
I have dealt with with people who thought they had innocuous tats on their bodies. When I asked one girl why the “t” in a word was an inverted Cross, she had no answer and was quite angry at the artist. She had no idea.
Sometimes tattoo artists have satanists curse the ink so that the bearer have a permanent malefice (demonic fortuna – something akin to an anti-sacramental, a physical object that bears a curse) in their body. Why do they do this? A proclivity to malice, for certain; but also so that they can earn brownie points from Satan for the amount of people they can infect.
When I decommission tattoos, I use the formula from the Roman Ritual for “Reconciliation of a Profaned Church”, altering the words where appropriate. I paint over it with exorcised oil, using a Q-tip. Sometimes they scream as if I were skinning them alive. Sometimes it just hurts a bit. Often they feel nothing.
I know an ex-nun who got some ink. When I did a mental exorcism of the tattoo (She wasn’t looking at me and didn’t know what I was doing in my mind) she jolted. Upon telling her that she was compromised thanks to the tattoo, she then told me that she had all the nuns in her former convent get ink from the same guy. All of them left the convent within 6 months.
I deal with this stuff all the time. Some of the suffering that has resulted from it is quite sad. Onthe other hand, the worst part of tattoos is that they offend the One Who made our bodies and owns them.