Malta’s chief exorcist Fr Elija Vella has died aged 81

Ten questions for Fr Elias Vella, the Maltese exorcist

The Conventual Franciscan Order in Malta has announced the death of renowned exorcist Fr Elija Vella aged 81.

Vella was born in St Paul’s Bay and studied in Rome where he graduated in theology in 1964, going on to start his pastoral mission a year later.

Vella has for long been considered Malta’s main exorcist and headed the Maltese church’s Occult and Satanism Commission tasked with studying phenomena related to occult, spriritism and Satanism.

Vella was a popular figure on television discussion shows and in December 2020 featured in the first season of MaltaToday’s From The Fringe series, where he shared his experiences as an exorcist.

Asked whether a real exorcism was anything near the phenomena depicted in the film The Exorcist, where heads spin and victims levitate, Vella had said the things seen in the film, can happen and have happened, but don’t happen during a single exorcism on a single person.

“This means that the director put every possible paranormal activity into one person and that made the character quite scary. You may have an individual who turns their head in an exaggerated manner; you don’t imagine how he or she is able to do it but these things can happen. Elevation can occur and aggressiveness is one of the most common occurrences, meaning you have someone who can flatten a chair as if it was a piece of cardboard,” he replied.

Fr Elias was Minister Provincial of his Province from 1974 to 1986 and parish priest in his native town. In 1994, Vella was decorated with the Midalja San Pawl by the local council.