According to Catholicism, who is the leader of devils?

Question

We come across many verses in the Bible - both Old Testament and New Testament, where the name of devil is mentioned. For instance:

• Is 14: 12: How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! how art thou cut down to the ground, which didst weaken the nations!
• Lk 10:18 : And he said unto them, I beheld Satan as lightning fall from heaven
• Mat 4:10 : Then saith Jesus unto him, Get thee hence, Satan: for it is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve.
• Lk 11: 15: But some of them said, He casteth out devils through Beelzebub the chief of the devils.

Satan appears to be a generic name in that Jesus himself reprimands Peter:

"But he turned, and said unto Peter, Get thee behind me, Satan: thou art an offence unto me: for thou savourest not the things that be of God, but those that be of men." (Mtt 16:23)

My question, therefore is: Who, according to Catholic Church, is the leader of all devils?

Answer 1

According to Catholicism, who is the leader of devils?

In one or two words: Satan also called Lucifer.

This answer will be based on the Catholic traditions in regards to Satan and the nine choirs of angels.

Although it is now generally accept that there are nine choirs of angel and each choir is of angel is different and ranked accordingly.

During the Middle Ages, many schemes were proposed, some drawing on and expanding on Pseudo-Dionysius, others suggesting completely different classifications. According to medieval Christian theologians, the angels are organized into several orders, or "Angelic Choirs

Pseudo-Dionysius (On the Celestial Hierarchy) and Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologica) drew on passages from the New Testament, specifically Ephesians 1:21 and Colossians 1:16, to develop a schema of three Hierarchies, Spheres or Triads of angels, with each Hierarchy containing three Orders or Choirs. Although both authors drew on the New Testament, the Biblical canon is relatively silent on the subject, and these hierarchies are considered less definitive than biblical material.

Choirs in medieval theology

St. Thomas Aquinas in Summa Theologica (1225–1274):

1. Seraphim, Cherubim, and Thrones;

2. Dominations, Virtues, and Powers;

3. Principalities, Archangels, and Angels. - Christian angelology (Wikipedia)

St Thomas Aquinas' list is by far the most widely accepted list of angelic choirs and places the Seraphic order of angel as being at the highest level of angels followed by the Cherubim, and so on. According to St Thomas:

1. The angels that rebelled and became demons did not lose their nature or their connatural gifts. They cast away, by their sin, the grace in which they were created. They did not cast away the beatific vision, for they never had it. Now, if we think of angelic orders as orders of angels in glory, then, of course, there are no orders of bad angels. But if we consider angelic orders as order of angelic nature simply, there are orders among the demons.

2. Certainly, there is a precedence among bad angels; there is a subjection of some to others.

3. Demons of superior nature do not enlighten inferior demons; enlightenment here could only mean the manifestation of truth with reference to God, and the fallen angels have perversely and permanently turned away from God. But demons can speak to one another, that is, they can make known their thoughts to one another, that is, they can make known their thoughts to one another, for this ability belongs to the angelic nature which the demons retain.

4. The nearer creatures are to God the greater is their rule over other creatures. Therefore, the good angels rule and control the demons. - Orders Among the Fallen Angels

This stated it only makes sense that Satan was a Seraphim, for surely some of the Seraphim fell in great revolt against God. Although one can not say with certainty it is generally believed Satan was a Seraphim.

Sin of the Fallen Angels

3. Lucifer who became Satan, leader of the fallen angels, wished to be as God. This prideful desire was not a wish to be equal to God, for Satan knew by his natural knowledge that equality of creature with creator is utterly impossible. Besides, no creature actually desires to destroy itself, even to become something greater. On this point man sometimes deceives himself by a trick of imagination; he imagines himself to be another and greater being, and yet it is himself that is somehow this other being. But an angel has no sense-faculty of imagination to abuse in this fashion. The angelic intellect, with its clear knowledge, makes such self-deception impossible. Lucifer knew that to be equal with God, he would have to be God, and he knew perfectly that this could not be. What he wanted was to be as God; he wished to be like God in a way not suited to his nature, such as to create things by his own power, or to achieve final beatitude without God's help, or to have command over others in a way proper to God alone.

4. Lucifer, chief of the sinning angels, was probably the highest of all the angels. But there are some who think that Lucifer was highest only among the rebel angels. - Angels: From the Teachings of St. Thomas Aquinas

Answer 2

TL;DR

All four Bible citations talk about the same devil, as Satan, Lucifer, and Beelzebub are different personalities (and names) of the same devil according to the Roman Catholic tradition,^{[citation needed]} the Church Fathers,^{[citation needed]} and self-revelations of the daemons during exorcisms.

Long answer

Fr Chad Ripperger (a Roman Catholic exorcist) says (source: Why the Devil Hates (and Fears) Mary w/ Fr. Chad Ripperger, minute 11:20) :

At a certain point, I had Beelzebub in a case and at a certain point during the session, God commanded him to tell me something and just out of the blue hi just looks at me and he says I’m the inversion of the Holy Ghost and then boomi checks out; I couldn’t get him back to the surface. What does that even mean? And I knew I had known from my research and studies, two things:

1. exorcists say that they manifest differently and so they actually thought they were different demons;
2. fathers of the Church are very clear: oh, no, no, no, he’s the same guy.

How does this work? Lucifer, Beezebub, and Satan are the same guy.

So then I started asking Our Lady of Sorrows, ‘What am I seeing?’

And then it just clicked. I always think that she gave me the grace.

So, in the next session, I referred him as the third personality of Satan and all of a sudden he just stopped, he was stunned and it was kind of one of those Hollywood-couldn’t-produce kind of expressions. He was stunned, fearful, okay, now the gloves are coming off; you know, the whole bit. I mean, there’s just this whole complexion of things. And I said, ‘Was the trifocation [I am not sure how to write that word; is it trifurcation?] of your personality the punishment for wanting to be God?’ And, he woudn’t answer, […] so the silence is a yes.

Later, he said, ‘Yes, it was.’

And I said, ‘Lucifer is the second personality of Satan, the inversion of Christ whose Light from Light, because Lucifer means Light Bearer,’ and he said, ‘Yes.’ ‘And Satan is the inversion of the first personality [the first person of God, i.e. God the Father], because he’s the Father of Lies.’ […]

Basically, God split his personality as a punishment. […]

And then I found out through later research that there [were] actually cases in the past that that had come up in the past it was just not a piece of knowledge that was passed on. It’s in the literature, but you’d have to dig for it.

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Therefore, the following three names are for the same person:

• Satan:
  • he is an inversion to God the Father;
  • he is the Father of Lies (he is a chronological liar, he lies at everything; even when it would go better for him, he’s still going to lie);
  • he (his behaviour) is kind of non-descript (according to Fr Chard Ripperger);
• Lucifer:
  • he is an inversion to God the Son (Jesus Christ);
  • he never manifests himself the same way;
  • other names: Light Bearer, Morning Star;
• Beelzebub (or Beelzebul):
  • he is an inversion to God the Holy Spirit;
  • he manifests in a very distinctive way (more or less, he manifests himself the same way; i.e. he is shifty, constantly changing, deceitful).

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From the very same video I sourced this, here are some other places Fr Chad Ripperger talks about this:

• minute 8:16;
• minute 11:50.

I think that watching the entire video (multiple times) will be beneficial to any person who wants to find the truth.