I just threw up twice over Nancy Pelosi

I'm not sure which is worse, the pablum of Maureen Dowd breathlessly fellating her "satin and steel" leadership, or the New York Post reporting that she supposedly had their house exorcised after husband Paul was attacked there, with a sidebar of wingnut Bill Donohue going Conservative Cafeteria Catholic by attacking her for believing in evil spirits (you ARE a secular one yourself, Bill) and exorcisms, which Rome still officially supports. That said, the Post piece is based on part of the Dowd story, so no, BlueAnon, not made-up bullshit.

The MoJo Dowd piece is semi-vacuous. No tough questions, and letting Pelosi get away with claims such as she would be the only House Dem as Speaker who could stand up to Trump, or her excoriating NY governor Kathy Hochul for not boosting House Dems' chances there by running a tough-on-crime campaign, ignoring that she ran a suck up to Republicans one instead.

So, what about this exorcism stuff???

Is this real? Yes, Pelosi's daughter told the story to Dowd at the top link. If you hit a paywall, here's the Daily Beast. Exact quote:

“I think that weighed really heavy on her soul. I think she felt really guilty. I think that really broke her. Over Thanksgiving, she had priests coming, trying to have an exorcism of the house and having prayer services.”

Oof.

The NY Post? Let's do this pull quote.

“If it’s genuine, she needs psychiatric help,” Donohue continues. “And if not, it’s another example of Nancy Pelosi exploiting the Catholic Church for her own personal gain.” 

But Fr. Vincent Lampert, exorcist for the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Indianapolis, said exorcism could indeed be appropriate to combat “demonic infestation,” and the presence of evil that may linger in a place where violent crime has occurred. 

“It would be the recitation of a particular prayer, inviting the presence of God back into the house, casting out any presence of evil that may be there,” Lampert said. “Then the house would be blessed with holy water, reminding us of our new life in Christ, and the fact that we need not fear any evil, because recognizing that Christ is dwelling with us.” 

“I would say I get thousands of those requests every year,” he added.

As a good secularist, and a good ex-Lutheran who knows the Lutheran ties of the fiction called The Exorcist, it is funny as hell to see a superstitious Pelosi believe this AND at least as funny to see Donohue's bullshit called out.

And, speaking of The Exorcist? It would be funniest to see Pelosi spitting out pea soup like Linda Blair.

Per MoJo Dowd, that could be Kevin McCarthy, or better, The Donald, on the receiving end.

Is she "liberated" now, per the headline of MoJo Dowd's piece? Or is a second exorcism going to be needed, per the fictional account of The Exorcist? 

It is, and it's not just that Peter Blatty's book is a novel; his writing about the actual event he bases the book on is itself fictionalized. If you don't believe me, here's the first of a five-part debunking by Mark Opsasnick. A shorter summary of that is at the Skeptical Inquirer. A TL/DR summary of that, and of skeptical observation of exorcisms in general is also at Skeptical Inquirer.

People who have read things like Joe Nickell's piece know that kids will fake all sorts of things, and yes, including demonic possession. It would appear, per Part IV of the big debunk, that Ronald Hunkeler, perhaps egged on by, or double-daring against, a neighbor friend, played up things he was doing even before newspapers, Blatty et al played them up further. Part of the "playing up," per an older brother of the neighbor friend, was Hunkeler playing off his grandmother, an old Kraut Lutheran. (That's how my alma mater of graduate school, Concordia Seminary in St. Louis, got tied in. And, yes, that was whispered about, or discussed, when I was there 30 years ago.) Both her and her daughter, the kid's mom — and an only child to boot — were themselves reportedly obsessed with the Ouija board. Ron himself was reportedly sadistic toward animals, an exhibitor of tantrum-like anger, and more.

Specifically, contra claims by Thomas Allen, the Father Hughes attempted exorcism never happened.

As for the St. Louis Catholic exorcism, an assistant, Father Walter Hallorhan, notes that most of the claims about Hunkeler's actions were later overblown. He didn't really tell Opsasnick who overblew them, whether it was one of the two leads, Father Mark Bishop or Father William Bowdern.

As for more details about Ronald Hunkeler beyond the above? Opsasnick talked to him — or tried to — at the tail end of his investigation, and was pretty much cut off. He's now dead, Hunkeler is.