The Exorcist

Karras attends his mother’s funeral. Afterward, his uncle tries to offer comfort but Karras only wants to be alone. He drives home overcome by memories and grief. Back in Georgetown, he cannot eat or rest. Friends offer condolences and Father Dyer appears with a bottle of scotch. They talk while they drink; Dyer recounts the events at Chris’s party until Karras is drunk enough to sleep. Dyer helps him to bed and leaves. 

Karras awakes after a nightmare about his mother. He feels for the scotch and begins drinking again while he weeps. Karras remembers his uncle phoning to say that he has had Karras’s mother committed. He gets up early to perform Mass, praying for his mother. While he prays, he remembers his mother’s screaming fits while in the asylum. She stopped only to ask him why he did this to her. Karras hopes that there is someone to hear his prayer but no longer thinks that this is the case. 

Later that day, a young priest visits Karras. They talk about “a familiar problem: the terrible loneliness of priests” (63). After the young man leaves, Karras feels a moment of peace. That afternoon, an older priest tells Karras that there has been another desecration: A statue of the Virgin Mary has been painted like a harlot and the altar cards now describe—in error-strewn but readable Latin—a sexual encounter between the Virgin Mary and Mary Magdalene.