Theophilus Riesinger

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Rev. Theophilus Riesinger, O.M.

Theophilus Riesinger (February 27, 1868 - November 9, 1941) a Roman Catholic priest who was born in Germany and later resided in Marathon, Wisconsin, in the United States.

He was ordained on May 29, 1899 and later was an exorcist. In 1928, he traveled to a convent in Earling, Iowa where he performed the Roman Catholic rite of exorcism on a forty year old woman. After twenty-three days of exorcism Father Theophilus was fatigued. Two days before Christmas 1928, the demons were driven out and the woman cried, “My Jesus mercy. Praised be Jesus Christ.”

The incident was written up by Rev. Celestine Kapsner as Begone Satan! in 1935 and became a well known case. Father Riesinger himself wrote about the case in a 1934 book called The Earling possession case;: An exposition of the exorcism of "Mary", a demoniac. Another book about the case is The Devil Rocked Her Cradle, by David St. Clair (Dell,1987).