How old was the boy that William S. Bowdern performed an exorcism on?
William S. Bowdern Father William S. Bowdern, S.J. (February 13, 1897 - April 25, 1983) was a Catholic priest of the Society of Jesus in St. Louis, Missouri, United States. He was the author of "The Problems of Courtship and Marriage" printed by "Our Sunday Visitor" in 1939. He was a graduate of and taught at St. Louis University High School; he also taught at St. Louis University. Bowdern participated in an exorcism of Roland Doe in 1949. The incident became the basis of William Peter Blatty's novel, "The Exorcist".
Gerald Ridsdale Gerald Francis Ridsdale (born 20 May 1934), an Australian laicised Catholic priest, was convicted between 1993 and 2013 of a large number of child sexual abuse and indecent assault charges against 54 children aged as young as four years. The offences occurred from the 1960s to the 1980s while Ridsdale worked as a school chaplain at St Alipius Boys' School in the Victorian regional city of Ballarat.