litharriel: (Default)
[personal profile] litharriel
21/09/2005 - 5:35:11 PM


The body of a Romanian nun who died in June during an exorcism ritual
was exhumed today for forensic tests, the state news agency reported.

Irina Maricica Cornici, 23, died June 15 at the secluded Holy Trinity
convent in the north-east Romanian village of Tanacu after she was
tied up for several days without food or water and chained to a cross
during the ritual.

The exorcism ritual was led by Daniel Petru Corogeanu, 29, a monk who
served as the convent's priest, and four other nuns.

The five were charged with murder and denying a person's freedom, and
released from jail on July 27 pending trial. No trial date has been
set.

Prosecutors and forensic doctors arrived this morning in the village
of Perieni, Cornici's home village, where the nun is buried, the
Rompres news agency reported.

Before that, Cornici's parents mourned at their daughter's grave and
prayed.

"It is good that they exhumed her, maybe this way the truth will come
out and those who killed her will pay," her father, Costica Antohi,
was quoted as saying by Rompres.

The exhumation was requested by Corogeanu a few weeks ago, in a bid
to prove his innocence, and the General Prosecutor's Office agreed
earlier this month.

"Through this exhumation we hope to find out the real causes of the
death," Rompres quoted the suspects' lawyer, Maria Ilisei, as
saying. "It will be a complex affair to provide all the answers that
remained unanswered from the first examination."

Cornici's death stunned Romania and prompted the Orthodox Church to
promise reforms, including psychological tests for those seeking to
enter monasteries.

The church, which has benefited from a religious revival in recent
years, condemned the Tanacu ritual as "abominable" and banned
Corogeanu from the priesthood and excluded the four nuns from the
church.

In 1999, when the Vatican issued its first new guidelines since 1614
for driving out devils, it urged priests to take modern psychiatry
into account in deciding who should be exorcised.

Date: 2005-09-29 07:29 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] navalaya.livejournal.com
*genuine shock!*

Date: 2005-09-29 07:45 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] litharriel.livejournal.com
terrible, isn't it? :-/

Date: 2005-09-29 08:29 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] navalaya.livejournal.com
Baffles me. How they managed to put someone in that position in the first place. Didn't think it was still the dark ages. *shakes her head* I hope they are held accountable, it would be sad to encourage that kind of behavior to continue unchecked.

Date: 2005-09-29 10:20 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] aureantes.livejournal.com
They are indeed being held accountable and sentenced to prison terms, though the monk who performed the "exorcism" was notably unrepentant of any wrongdoing in the case, saying that at last (and at least?) Irina was free and at peace. He also said he was just following standard practice, though the Romanian Orthodox Church has now judged the case as having been handled improperly (i.e., without taking the psychological profile of the subject into consideration first), and as warranting a thorough review of the proper standards regarding exorcism.

I have all the info on the case at the newsgroup I run, hyperlucidity -- http://groups.yahoo.com/group/hyperlucidity -- and you can retrieve all articles in the site archives just using the search keywords "schizophrenia" and "Romania" (rhyming's a good way to remember). Or "Romania"-"nun"-"exorcism" oughta do the trick as well.

Date: 2005-10-03 03:56 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] navalaya.livejournal.com
Thanks, shall do.

Date: 2005-09-29 10:56 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] litharriel.livejournal.com
Agreed whole-heartedly

Poem I wrote on the subject......

Date: 2005-09-29 10:10 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] aureantes.livejournal.com
[I posted this at the hyperlucidity group back in June....]
==========================================================


If you've got a case of schizophrenia
stay the heck out of Romania
for they'll stick you in a cell
and try to save your soul from hell.

That old religious atmosphere
will get your 'demons' all in gear
(you might have been just feeling fine--
but lo!--'the Devil's concubine'!)

So gag and starve and flog and bind,
the Evil Nasty's flaws to find,
and when at last the body fails,
then God be praised, it's gone what ails.

And never mind the hue and cry--
they just don't understand...
when souls are in such torment here,
'tis sin to stay one's righteous hand.



--K. Aurencz Zethmayr, 6-26-05

(Okay, I was inspired....)

Re: Poem I wrote on the subject......

Date: 2005-09-29 11:04 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] litharriel.livejournal.com
I remember it! :-D Should be published somewhere...

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