V. On Adjuration

What is adjuration? - Adjuration is: an appeal made through God, the Saints, or a sacred thing, to induce an intellectual nature to do or omit something. An appeal, that is, an invocation of the name of God, etc. Through God, etc., indicates the motive, for love, reverence, or fear of which the one adjuring intends to induce another to do or omit something. Made to induce: superiors indeed by entreating, inferiors by commanding. Yet no obligation is induced by force of the adjuration, but the obligation is only by force of command, which receives greater force from adjuration. An intellectual nature, namely God, Angels, men, demons. "Yet we use adjuration in one way toward man and in another way toward God. For by adjuring man we intend to change his will through reverence for the sacred thing; which indeed we do not intend concerning God, whose will is immutable. But that we obtain something from God through his eternal will is not from our merits, but from his goodness." S. Th. 2. 2, q. 90, a. 1. And thus God can be adjured through himself and through his attributes. Therefore irrational creatures are not properly and directly adjured, but only indirectly, namely by adjuring God or the Saints that their use may help us, or demons that through them they may cease to harm. 1 Thess. 5:27; L. 1, 2, 3; Bouquillon, de Virt. relig., l. 2, p. 4.

Of how many kinds is adjuration? - One adjuration is solemn or private, according as it is made by ministers of the Church and in the manner determined by her, or is destitute of solemnities; another is deprecative or imperative, according as it is made through prayers or through command. L. 1, 3; Struggl 37 seqq.

What things are required for the liceity of adjuration? - That adjuration be licit, three things are required, as in an oath, namely: 1. Truth, that is, that the one adjuring truly intend to attain what he asks, and that the cause for which he asks be true. But lack of this truth will rarely be more than venial, since God is not in reality invoked as witness of the false. Hence a beggar who pretends that he is poor and asks through Jesus Christ sins against religion; nevertheless his sin is venial. 2. Justice, from the lack of which one asking for a gravely evil thing certainly sins gravely. But if someone asks for a lightly evil thing, some hold that it is mortal, others venial. Yet if someone deliberately adjured God himself or the Saints to furnish him help for a thing even lightly illicit, he would sin mortally, because such adjuration would be directly against the holiness of God. 3. Judgment, that is, due discretion; and therefore both that a sufficient cause of adjuring be present, and that due submission and resignation to the divine will be present. Lack of this judgment certainly is only venial. L. 2.

Is adjuration against demons licit? - Private adjuration against demons is indeed licit to all. But solemn adjuration through exorcisms belongs only to ministers duly ordained in the Church, namely exorcists; for it is an act of order. But in the present discipline of the Church, at least from introduced custom, it cannot be done except with the express license of the Bishop, without which it is prohibited under grave obligation. Cf. C. Benedict XIV, Magno cum animi, 2 Jun. 1751, § 34; and the Exorcisms published by order of Leo XIII, to which indulgences are attached even for private recitation. S. C. de Pr. F., 18 May 1890.

Adjuration against demons must not be made in a deprecative mode, but only in an imperative mode. For the former mode of adjuring seems to pertain to a certain benevolence or friendship, which it is not licit to use with demons. The latter mode is licit, because although the acts of demons are not subject to our disposition, nevertheless they are subject to the divine disposition and to that of the holy angels. Therefore by adjuring demons through the power of the divine name we can command them and compel them not to harm us spiritually or corporally. Such adjuration of a demon can in no way be made so that he furnish help, because this would pertain to having some fellowship with them, unless perhaps from a special impulse or divine revelation adjuration were made to obtain something through them. But it must be made only to remove harms and the vexation of one possessed. The reason is that power has not been given to us by God for invoking demons, but only for putting them to flight, as the most hostile enemies of God and of souls. Luke 9:1; 10:19; Mark 16:17; Roman Ritual, de Exorc. obsess. Exorcisms always obtain some effect, at least by weakening the powers of demons for harming, although they do not always have the infallible effect of expelling them, as is clear from experience and is plain from Matt. 17:18, 19. Struggl 42, 43; L. 4, 5; S. Th. 2. 2, q. 90, a. 2.

Does he sin who mixes conversations with a demon? - The doctors commonly say that he who had many useless conversations with a possessing demon cannot be excused from grave sin. Pallavicini affirms that to ask from a demon one or another curious thing is mortal; but St. Alphonsus more probably says that it is venial, if the adjuration is truly made in an imperative mode. At least it is venial, because this would pertain to vanity and curiosity. But it is licit for exorcists to interrogate a demon about all things which conduce to his expulsion, for example, about the number and names of those who dwell in the possessed person, so that the adjuration may be directed to them, from what time and for what cause, so that it may be removed, about the sign of departure, etc. L. 5.

Is it licit to ask imperatively from a demon the manifestation of some truth? - R. Negatively, because ministers do not seem to have any power except only of interrogating about those things which contribute to expelling him. And this besides seems to pertain to a certain fellowship with the demon. S. Th. 2. 2, q. 90, a. 2 ad 3. But it would be licit if this conduced to divine glory. S. Th. 2. 2, q. 95, a. 4 ad 1; L. 5.