Excommunication of Individuals Possessed by Evil Spirits at Glamorgan Conference

“All appeared to be enjoying themselves while the President portrayed the splendor pertaining to Zion; everyone, that is, except for the devils alone, who at the time, to draw the attention of the Saints from such valuable teaching, possessed two or three of the Saints, to the extent that they disturbed the entire meeting and kept the President from going forward. Two of these persons had been possessed by evil spirits many times before because of hiding their transgressions, and so it was this time as well. The spirits spoke through them, and did so in a supernatural voice, blaspheming and slandering the President and other officials, and challenging them to cast them out of their refuge. They said boldly that they could not be cast out—that they had a right to be in those two because of their transgressions; and we did not much doubt them, after hearing the whole story. After much prayer to rebuke them, but all in vain, the President was informed as to who the possessed persons were; and when he understood that they had transgressed after being pardoned so many times before, he decided to cut them off from the Church as the only way of silencing the spirits. For this purpose the elders were called together, and no sooner were hands laid on them to excommunicate the one and the other, than both of the two women returned to their normal comportment, and they began to tidy their hair and their clothes, as if nothing had happened. — Udgorn Seion (Zion's Trumpet), January 1849 (English translation by Ronald D. Dennis)”