EXORCISM. It’s back. From the courtrooms of South Africa to the cornfields of heartland America, the battle for your soul has taken a decidedly physical turn.

Possessed presidential candidates. Demon-haunted miscreants. Snake-spirit infested parishioners.

Exorcism just keeps appearing in the headlines.

A so-called ‘wave’ of drug-related satanic killings sweeping Mexico (with the alleged intention of turning the victims into vampires) has resulted in calls for a ‘Magno Exorcisto’.

A confessed killer in Cape Town is appealing for an ‘exorcism’ as part of his sentencing, to expel the ‘demonic forces’ that ‘made him’ behead his 15-year-old victim and sell his body parts to a traditional healer.

And late last year, staff in a German hotel were stunned to find a 41-year-old mother beaten to death by her South Korean family (aged between 44 and 15) in an effort to ‘drive out the devil’.

Have the gates to Hell truly been opened?

Or is there some other source for this surge in spiritual warfare?

THEY’RE BACK

Even the most eminent do not appear immune to the Devil’s advocates.

US Republican Presidential candidate Ted Cruz — himself a loudly professed Southern Baptist — was confronted earlier this year in New Hampshire by two protesters armed with a wooden cross and a mirror.

Their objective: To free him of a power-hungry evil spirit. The outcome? The self-proclaimed exorcists stated only time would tell.

The medieval-flavoured rite one seemed to have gone the way of trial-by-fire and pre-purchased forgiveness of yet-to-be-committed sins.

Exorcism appeared well and truly dead-and-buried after a public scandal in 1973 when a young German woman, Anneliese Michel, was killed after repeated rituals.

But a turnaround of sorts began in 2004. An official decree from Pope John Paul II instructed every Catholic diocese to appoint an exorcist.

Who would dare disobey?

DEMON HAUNTED WORLD

It’s not just ‘a Catholic thing’. Pentecostal churches have long been enthusiastically adding their high-profile branding to the ceremony. And virtually every flavour of religion — be it ancient Assyrian or Hindu — mentions some form of rite to expel oppositional spirits in its holy texts.

But the Catholic International Association of Exorcist’s upped the ante in 2014: Their annual meeting declared occult activity was on the rise. (For the uninitiated, this includes believing in the power of crystals, t’ai chi and yoga — as well as the more traditional Ouija boards, palm-reading and tarot cards.)

Its head, Italian priest Gabriele Amorth, is something of an ace: He claims to have personally cast out 160,000 demons.

Despite this metaphysical massacre, he needs help. To that end the Regina Apostolorum pontifical institution of the Legionaries of Christ is about to conduct its annual one-week course on exorcism in Rome.

“We have a very secularised society in which, more than in the past, there’s the tendency to open the doors to occultism and esotericism,” said Father Pedro Barrajon, director of the Istituto Sacerdos.

The course is intended to train participants in recognising at-risk members of congregations.

“Demonic influence is favoured by magical practices and the use of fortune tellers, which can have a real influence leading even to possession,” Barrajon said.

SIGNS OF THE TIMES

The Catholic News Agency in the United States recently published an article describing how to recognise the demon-possessed.

Interviewing one Father Cipriano de Meo, whose exorcist credentials dating from 1952, it concedes most cases are, in fact, mental illness. Not possession.

The Catholic Catechism is specific in its application:

“Exorcism is directed at the expulsion of demons or to the liberation from demonic possession through the spiritual authority which Jesus entrusted to his Church,” it reads. “ Illness, especially psychological illness, is a very different matter; treating this is the concern of medical science. Therefore, before an exorcism is performed, it is important to ascertain that one is dealing with the presence of the Evil One, and not an illness.”

The only way to tell the difference, Father de Meo says, is through a personal revelation to the priest — and the reaction of the patient to prayer.

“A possessed person has various general attitudes towards an exorcist, who is seen by the Adversary as an enemy ready to fight him,” he is quoted as saying.

“There’s no lack of frightening facial expressions, threatening words or gestures and other things,” he said, “but especially blasphemies against God and Our Lady.”

DARK AGE GONE MAINSTREAM

The current head of the Catholic Church, Pope Francis, may promote progressive ideas such as climate change, income equality and — under limited circumstances — contraception. But he’s also a big fan of exorcism.

Religion historian David Frankfurter argues devils and demons tend to be thrust into the limelight whenever a community is confronted by fresh outside forces.

In the modern world, it’s an unavoidable condition. Sexual liberation. Equal opportunities. Migration. Open markets.

The winds of change blow fiercely. But are they demon-sourced?

Old fashioned spirits are a way of making sense of something new and complex, says Demonology, Posession and exorcism lecturer at Texas State University Joseph Laycock.

In the hands of a priest, exorcism gives them supernatural relevance in a relentless — and confounding — real world.

THE SWORD OF THE WORD

Despite all this, experts say public interest in possession appears tightly tied to what’s on television. Little wonder, then, that there’s a remake of The Exorcist in the offing.

But is exorcism actually on the rise?

Michael Cuneo, sociologist and author of newly published “American Exorcism,” asserts “Exorcism is more readily available today in the United States than perhaps ever before.”

He goes on to say: “By conservative estimates, there are at least five or six hundred evangelical exorcism ministries in operation (in the US) today, and quite possibly two or three times this many.”

Australia? It’s not telling.

Unlike their overseas counterparts, Australian Catholic diocese have been backwards about coming forward with the exploits of their proactive priests.

But they’re certainly there.

The Catholic Church in Australia recently admitted to having up to 30 exorcists on the march against evil.

And their guide book, The Manual of Minor Exorcisms, was written by the Archbishop of Hobart, Julian Porteous.

@JamieSeidel