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Here's the latest innovation in exorcism from Teen Exorcist Squad leader Reverend Bob Larson - exorcism via Skype. Never one to pass up an opportunity to take on a demon in exchange for donations to his ministry, Larson takes advantage of the video chat application to perform exorcisms all over the world without those pesky travel expenses. There's no word yet on whether he performs all of the online exorcisms himself, or if he passes some of them off to members of his squad.
Despite the tongue-in-cheek commentary, the article does raise a valid point. Magick performed remotely is always going be less effective than magick performed in person, simply because the link to the target is not as strong. Back in the early days of the Internet a number of chaos magicians tried to do group rituals over chat, and the ones that I followed back then proved pretty ineffective - though I'll grant there may be somebody who figured out how to make it work and then never released their findings. It's also the reason that astral initiations may do something, but not nearly as much as real temple initiations done in the physical presence of officers.
My guess is that Larson is falling back on the classic scripture that in Jesus' name all things are possible, the usual Christian explanation for why they expect poorly constructed spiritual technology to function. There's always the possibility that he has come up with a novel method that will prove effective, but given his history and background I highly doubt it.
The idea of using Skype came from a Scottsdale reverend Bob Larson who claims that thanks to Skype he can take a crack at demons all over the world. So far he claims to have banished 20,000 demons to his nether regions, unless we heard him wrong. We guess that some of those demons would have been doubling up, as demons sometimes share bodies to avoid paying council tax.
Larson said that exorcism is the process of expelling an evil spirit from an individual who has become somehow invaded and demonised by that being, and sending it back to hell and freeing the person. It is not clear how it would work over Skype. While you don't have to worry about flying beds, it is really tricky to spray holy water in anything's face over the net. Your video can also be disturbed by puke splatter.
Despite the tongue-in-cheek commentary, the article does raise a valid point. Magick performed remotely is always going be less effective than magick performed in person, simply because the link to the target is not as strong. Back in the early days of the Internet a number of chaos magicians tried to do group rituals over chat, and the ones that I followed back then proved pretty ineffective - though I'll grant there may be somebody who figured out how to make it work and then never released their findings. It's also the reason that astral initiations may do something, but not nearly as much as real temple initiations done in the physical presence of officers.
My guess is that Larson is falling back on the classic scripture that in Jesus' name all things are possible, the usual Christian explanation for why they expect poorly constructed spiritual technology to function. There's always the possibility that he has come up with a novel method that will prove effective, but given his history and background I highly doubt it.
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