1Lent C,
The phenomenon of the Son of
God being tempted by the devil baffles the imagination: the attempt, that is,
to induce God to rebel against Himself.
The puzzlement is augmented when one ponders that it was by the Holy
Spirit that Jesus was led into the desert for this. Why did God throw Himself
into the contest with a creature of His–a fallen creature at that? If the
victory was predictably certain, was this mere play-acting on Jesus’ part, or
did he consent to experience the lure of evil for some other useful purpose?
Being reverent Christians, we
certainly cannot ascribe anything unbecoming to the Son of God, lest of all a
failure in integrity. We know that our Lord’s human life was “for our sake,”
and not for some experimental interest of His own. Everything about His blessed
life, all of His words, are instructive for us, edifying,
and a grace. If Jesus our Savior acquiesced to a match with the devil it had to
have been for our advantage.
In past years, I have
commented on the three proposals of the devil that constituted his temptations.
Today I want to take a broader look at the episode to examine the ‘dynamics’ of
temptation. The Church, I believe, wants us, on the first Sunday of Lent, to
consider the origin of sin, to make an analytical reflection on the processes
of our disobedience, our failures, our protest against given truth.
It helps in assessing the
history of our personal sins, to be reminded that each of us humans–with one
sole exception–has come into the world with a fundamental defect, a debility
that leans in the direction of evil. The now mostly abandoned Freudian idea
that psychological disorders have their genesis in infancy is flawed not
because it attributes too much to one’s earliest years, but because it isn’t
comprehensive enough and doesn’t reach back far enough. Original sin’s
foundational derangement can manifest itself in a wide variety of ways
depending on the circumstances of each individual’s life. The devil, ever an
astute observer, heeds the particular propensities of each person from his
earliest days, and thereupon devises a strategy to turn him into a weapon
against his Creator. Jesus, necessarily without sin, suffers no disadvantage
such as we in bearing the sting of concupiscence, that
is, of the cleavage between what we know and what we desire. Yet, I believe
that His holy fasting for an astoundingly protracted period of time was meant
as a quasi-assimilation of our weakened condition. He wanted, in other words,
to experience the vulnerability of our condition, in order not-only to taste
the lure and tug of temptation, but to show us the way to success over the
devil’s blandishments.
Our Lord had once identified
the root of sin in the depth of heart. “What comes out of a man is what defiles
a man. For from within, out of the heart of a man, come evil thoughts,
fornication, theft, murder, adultery, coveting, wickedness, deceit, sensuality,
envy, slander, pride, foolishness. All these things come from within, and they defile a man” (Mk 7). The capital sins,
lodged deep within the heart, are ever ready to be released into the full air
of life and exploited by the devil. Since this is so, there must be in place a
guard, a custodian at the door of the heart to ensure the confinement of these
base tendencies.
Our Lord’s swiftness to reply
to the suggestions of the devil should not go unnoticed. The primordial fall of
mother Eve, the fatal turning point in the story of her sin, was the moment
that she began to consider the serpent’s proposal. “Did God really say....?, he slyly advanced. Genesis says that first she
looked, next delighted, then desired, took and ate. These initial and
middle stages, from temptation to act, are instructive. They show that sin
follows a course, a pattern. The retort
of Jesus to each proposition to sin is an instruction by the Master in how to
react successfully to sin’s attraction: firmly, immediately, calmly, with an
appeal for divine assistance.
It takes a grace and more
than one prayer for one to be able to recognize his temptations. The snake’s
poison is of a subtle kind. St. John Vianney, the Curé d’ars, wrote this:
It
is most unfortunate for ourselves if we do not know that we are tempted in
almost all our actions, at one time by pride, by vanity, by the good
opinion which we think people should have of us, at another by jealousy, by
hatred and by revenge. At other times, the devil comes to us with the foulest
and most impure images. You see that even in our prayers he distracts us and
turns our minds this way and that.... If our Lord was tempted, it was in order
to show us that we must be also. It follows, then, that we must expect
temptation.
We should ask for the grace
of the Holy Spirit to know our weak spots, to be able to dissect the stages
that sin passes through, and then to have the courage to cauterize sin in its
root.
It is worthy to note not only
that God has a care about us, but that the devil does also, he who sees what we
may not so well: that our souls are beautiful and of great worth.
I believe God wants you to
make some progress this Lent: progress, not only in seeing if you can keep to your
fasting, or if you can persevere in your Lenten promises for the whole duration
of the season, but progress, especially, in becoming more proficient in
battling against sin.
For the love of God, for the love your beautiful souls, be resolute in your determination to win. But, know that every victory over sin will never be to your credit only but also to the adjoining grace of Christ who Himself was tempted in every way that we are, but never sinned. (Hb.)