My story

Elias Vella is a Roman Catholic priest, Minorite friar, exorcist, and exercitator.

Translated from the Slovak version of the book:br> „Original title: Guarigione dal male e liberazione dal maligno Elias Vella OFM conv. “
Elias Vella OFM conv. 

My testimony

Before we begin to treat the theme of this book, I would like to tell you my testimony about how the Lord called me to walk along a new path after fifteen years of sacerdocy.

During the early years of my contacts with the charismatic renewal we invited father Robert Faricy, a Jesuit priest, to come to Malta. He taught us many things. I was particularly surprised by one of his sentences: conversion is very difficult to achieve for priests, notably for Jesuits. Some years later I realized he was right. According to my experience I can state that we, the priests, reach a certain point in our life in which we believe that we have achieved the highest peak of knowledge, i.e. the goal of our journey. In 1978 I had reached this point. Thanks God, the Lord had mercy upon me and He took me back to the right lane.

A big world meeting of charismatic renewal took place in Dublin. A group of young people urged me to accompany them to Ireland. I want to be honest with you: back then, I didn’t trust too much this renewal, because of exaggerated emotions which I experienced during several prayer meetings. At that time I was a theology teacher and I didn't want anything to disturb my habitudinal way of living. I also was the main superior of my rule in Malta; I used to lead spiritual exercises; I co-produced TV programmes; I was writing books. In other words, I felt my time-table was quite full. I didn’t need anything to add to my time-table. My way of living was stable.

My daily time-table did not include unplanned events. Nevertheless, those young people were really insisting. So I agreed to go with them. I made an exception and I broke my rules. They paid me the aeroplane ticket. So I was obliged to accept their offer. I said to myself: I had nothing to lose; so I’ll make them happy.

We travelled altogether. In Dublin there were about eight-hundred priests and religious and approximately two thousands sisters. The participants were divided according to their status – laics, priests, nuns – into small groups. I was in one of these groups; we were led by an Irish priest. At the beginning he asked us a very simple question: „Why did you come here?“

Those who answered before me provided (in my opinion) some strange answers. One older priest said: "I am here to meet the Lord.“ I didn't understand his answer. How is it possible that a priest in the final part of his life wants to meet the Lord! Čo What did he do during so many years of ministry as a priest? His answer was kind of nonsense. By the way, there were further answers that surprised me. Jeho odpoveď mi nedávala zmysel. Another one said: “I am here to pray the Lord and ask for my conversion.“ I was completely astonished. How can a priest ask for his own conversion? He is supposed to celebrate the Holy Mass every day. How can he look for conversion?

Then it was my turn to answer. I spontaneously and proudly stated: “I am a theologian, I teach theology and I want to find out what these new spiritual activities can offer. I am here just to learn something more. I want to enlarge my perspective and information in order to give it back to my students”.

My answer was quite clear. As usually, I didn't even think this experience could bring something to me, personally. I remember the Irish priest who led our group told me without hesitating:

"Father, kneel down! You need us to pray for you!“ I was confused. I was so amazed I was not able to provide any answers. I knelt down. All other priests were around me and started to pray for my conversion. I don’t know what happened. I just remember I started to cry and I felt something was opened in my heart.

Later, I went back to see my friends who were among the laics. As soon as they saw me, they noticed I was not the same as before and were curious to know what happened to me. Initially, I was not giving them any clear answer and I tried to convince them that nothing happened. Nevertheless, as they insisted, I spoke out. They listened to me with great interest. Then, they revealed that they had started to pray for my conversion some time before.

Since then, my life really changed. I did the same things as before, but in a different way. The Holy Spirit was with me and led my life by giving a new dimension to everything.