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By: Msgr. Charles Pope
What
is temptation? Temptation is the work of Satan to drag you to Hell. And
Satan can read you like a book and play you like piano. Do not
exaggerate his power, but do not underestimate it either.
Some of his subtlest work is done in the area of religious observance.
There, he can cloak himself quite easily in the lamb’s clothing of
piety, but, wolf that he really is, distort it, either through excess or
defect, thereby destroying you with what is good. Beware what some
spiritual writers call the “traps of the pious.” Consider some examples:
- He can discourage you with prayer by saying, “If only you would pray a little longer, God will give you what you seek.” But the deception is that if we can pray a little longer, then we can never have prayed enough.
Thus though we pray, we only feel guilty and inadequate. And since we
can never have prayed “enough,” prayer increasingly turns into a
burdensome task; God becomes a cruel taskmaster demanding longer and
more precise prayers. Or prayer becomes a superstitious endeavor whose
outcome we somehow control by the length and type of our prayers. Jesus
counsels us that the Father knows what we need and that we should not
think that merely multiple words and pious actions are necessary. We may
need to persevere in prayer over time, but God is not a cruel tyrant
demanding endless incantations.
- Satan can take the beautiful practice of praying the rosary, or attending daily Mass, or other devotions and
slowly incite in us a feeling of smug superiority, elitism, or pride.
Gradually, others are thought to be less devout, even in error, because
they do not do or observe what is optional or encouraged but
not required. What is beautiful and holy is thus employed to incite
ever-growing pride and cynicism. A most extreme form of this comes from
those who take the beautiful and powerful devotion to our Lady of Fatima
and allow Satan to set them against even the Pope and all the world’s
bishops by claiming that they failed, either ineptly or willfully, to
properly consecrate Russia. And thus one of our most beautiful and
informative apparitions can engender in some people distrust of the
Church and disunity from her, from multiple popes, and even from Sister
Lucia herself. It is an astonishingly crafty work of the evil one to
take what is good and religious and corrupt it in the minds of some.
- Satan can also take what IS required and turn it into a kind of religious minimalism, a way of keeping God at a distance.
And thus he tempts some souls with the notion that Sunday Mass, a
little something in the collection plate, and a few rushed prayers are
the end of religion rather than the beginning of it. Such observances
become a way of “checking off the God-box” and being done with God for
the week, rather than a foundation on which to build a beautiful and
ever-deepening relationship of love with God. Such minimal practices
become a form of “God-control” for those tempted in this way; it is as
if to say, “I’ve done what I am supposed to do, now God and the Church
have to leave me alone. God also needs to take care me now since I’ve
done what I’m required to do.” And thus the Church’s beautiful laws and
the requirements describing the basic duties or foundation for a
deepening relationship with God, become a kind of “separation
agreement,” insisting on very strict visiting hours and specifying who
gets what.
- Satan can take religious zeal and corrupt it into harsh and uncharitable zealotry.
He can take a love for the beauty of the Liturgy, ancient or new, and
turn it into a persnickety insistence on exactly the right ingredients,
at the expense of charity and at the cost of ridicule, false
superiority, and disunity. And thus, charity thrust aside, we say, “Just
make sure you celebrate the liturgy the way I like it. Anyone who
doesn’t like what I like is antiquarian, a knave, or an uncouth
troglodyte and must obviously hate the Church that I love so beautifully
…”
- Satan can take the beautiful love for the poor and
corrupt it into an enslaving paternalism that locks them into
dependency, or does not address their spiritual needs by speaking to
them respectfully of their sins, or does not seek to deepen their
spiritual and family lives. And thus the beautiful corporal works of
mercy are either set at odds with the spiritual works of mercy or are
considered adequate in themselves. Satan can send many to serve the
poor, armed with half-truths and approaches that merely bandage deeper
wounds without addressing them.
Well, you see, in a certain sense, any virtue will do.
Satan can make use of any of them and will seek to corrupt all of them,
even the religious ones. He will just as surely go to work in the life
of someone in a church pew, as in a brothel or the gutter. No one is
exempt from his work of temptation; his goal is to drag us to Hell.
What makes his work of corrupting virtue so insidious is the subtlety of his work,
for he takes something that is intrinsically good and seeks to corrupt
it, either by excess or defect, or to turn it into some sort of
caricature of itself.
Virtues, of course, are meant to work in combination with other virtues
that balance them. For example, charity should be balanced by truth and
truth by charity. Without charity, the truth can bludgeon; without
truth, charity can become harmful, patronizing, and wickedly affirming.
Charity and truth are meant to balance each other and to work
alongside other virtues in a delicate interplay.
One of Satan’s tactics is to take one virtue and isolate it from others.
Beware of these subtle tactics of Satan, who disguises himself well in
the robes of virtue. But they are detached virtues, virtues out of
balance and proportion.
Beware the traps of the pious.
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