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Vatican Warns of 'Deviant' Sect That Prays to Angels

(Nov. 5) -- In the eyes of the Catholic Church, praying to angels might seem pretty harmless. Compared with all the other vices out there, you'd think the church might even encourage it.

But the Vatican has sent a letter to Catholic bishops around the world warning them of a tiny, secretive sect that believes adherents can communicate with angels and combat demons. The letter, sent last month and made public Thursday, says a renegade faction of the sect is "disruptive" to the Vatican's authority and "deviant."

Opus Angelorum, which means "work of angels" in Latin, was founded by an Austrian housewife, Gabriele Bitterlich, who died in 1978. She apparently believed she could communicate with an archangel, who rattled off the names of hundreds of angels and demons vying for control of human beings. Her followers would pray to those angels by name, encouraging them to fight their evil counterparts.

Among other things, Bitterlich's followers -- fewer than 150 in the world -- believe that women who've had abortions are possessed by the devil.

The Vatican started investigating the sect after Bitterlich's death. In two documents dated 1982 and 1992, the church ordered Opus Angelorum to abide by all of its official scriptural teachings rather than new ones created by Bitterlich. Basically, the Vatican ruled that it's OK for Catholics to pray to angels, as long as they don't use the "names" of angels derived from "the alleged private revelations" of Bitterlich, according to the Vatican press office. Last month, the Vatican's Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith -- an office formerly headed by Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger before he became pope -- reopened the issue of Opus Angelorum in a letter to bishops. In the letter, Cardinal William Levada tells bishops that after the Vatican's investigation of the sect in the 1980s and '90s, it sent a delegate "possessing special faculties" to "regularize" the sect's relationship with the church.

The delegate, the Rev. Benoit Duroux, "successfully completed the work entrusted to him," the letter states without elaborating. "Today, thanks to the obedience of its members, the Opus Angelorum can be considered to be living loyally and serenely in conformity with the doctrine of the Church." But Levada also cautions against "a certain number of Opus Angelorum members, including some priests," who seek to restore a movement that "professes and practices all those things which were forbidden." He asks bishops to watch out for "discreet propaganda" and "be vigilant with regard to such activities, disruptive as they are of ecclesial communion, and to forbid them if they are present within their Dioceses." Opus Angelorum is believed to have only about 140 members, m

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