A Powerful Prayer Against Evil

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A powerful prayer (see below in its original entirety), written by Pope Leo XIII in 1888, was incorporated into the Romano Rituali in 1925 (Tit. XI, Cap. 3) with the rubric that it can be recited by bishops or by priests who have received the authority to do so from their Ordinaries. However, this rubric concerns the public prayers of the Church that are contained in the Romano Rituali. The same restriction does not apply to the private recitation of this prayer by any individual priest, or any of the faithful for that matter, as many bishops permitted and encouraged before Vatican II.
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The Church’s traditional teaching concerning the recitation of private exorcism prayers is contained in the Moral Theology manual of Dominicus Prümmer (Vol. II, §463):

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"It is not only clerics who can pronounce an exorcism in a private and secret manner, enjoying a special power over the demons in virtue of the order of the exorcistate, but also the laity themselves. It is in no way forbidden to the laity nor does any inconvenience arise from it. Thus we read in history how several lay persons, such as St Catherine of Siena and St Anthony of the Desert, cast out demons."
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Consequently, it is in no way inappropriate for the laity to recite the exorcism prayer of Pope Leo XIII, provided that they do so privately. It will certainly be powerful in overcoming the temptations and evil snares of the Devil.

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One wonders why it is that post-Vatican II authors have scruples concerning the recitation of this magnificent prayer, stating that since the 1983 Code of Canon Law it is no longer permitted. In fact, the same rule of the necessity of permission for public exorcisms is retained (Canon 1172). There is, however, no determination concerning the private recitation of an exorcism prayer, which is consequently perfectly permissible. Of course, we all know why it is that the modern church has changed the rites of exorcism, done away with the traditional powerful prayers, and discouraged all such commands in the name of Christ against the power of evil: it is that the Devil is henceforth treated more as a mythical figure than as a reality that we must deal with every day.

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St Peter teaches: “Be sober and watch: because your adversary the Devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour” (I Peter 5: 8).

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The gravity of sin, the danger of eternal damnation and the personal power of evil that the Devil is able to exercise in this corrupt world, the corruption of the Church, and its infiltration by its enemies, even to the papacy, are so many realities pushed aside by the modernists, but of which we are reminded in this prayer:
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On men depraved in mind and corrupt in heart the wicked dragon pours out like a most foul river the poison of his villainy, a spirit of lying, impiety and blasphemy; and the deadly breath of lust and of all iniquities and vices. Her most crafty enemies have engulfed the Church, the Spouse of the Immaculate Lamb, with sorrows, they have drenched her with wormwood; on all Her desirable things they have laid their wicked hands. Where the See of Blessed Peter and the Chair of Truth have been set up for the light of the Gentiles, there they have placed the throne of the abomination of their wickedness, so that, the Pastor having been struck, they may also be able to scatter the flock. Therefore, O thou unconquerable Leader, be present with the people of God against the spiritual wickednesses which are bursting in upon them: and bring them the victory.

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