Читать книгу Deliver us from the Evil one - Bernardo Olivera - Страница 7

We do not need to live long before wondering like Job, “Do not human beings have a hard service on earth?” (Job 7:1). When we try to live for God, we see the wisdom of Sirach, “My child, when you come to serve the Lord, prepare yourself for testing” (Sir 2:1). Saint Paul himself preached God’s Good News in Thessalonica “in spite of great opposition” (1 Thess 2:2).

The spiritual combat began long ago. The Apocalypse says, “War broke out in heaven; Michael and his angels fought against the dragon. The dragon and his angels fought back, but they were defeated, and there was no longer any place for them in heaven. The great dragon was thrown down, that ancient serpent, who is called the Devil and Satan, the deceiver of the whole world – he was thrown down to the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him” (Rev. 12:7-9).

Despite his rejection from heaven, Satan’s combat did not end: “When the dragon saw that he had been thrown down to the earth, he pursued the woman who had given birth to the male child. But the woman was given the two wings of the great eagle, so that she could fly from the serpent into the wilderness” (vv.13-14).

Jesus told his disciples, that the Devil “does not stand in the truth” (Jn 8:44) and much later his disciple Peter wrote, “God did not spare the angels when they sinned, but cast them into hell and committed them to chains of deepest darkness to be kept until the judgment” (2 Pet 2:4).

In his parable of the sower, Jesus warns us about the different enemies who can kidnap or kill the Word of God sown in our heart. The fact that Matthew, Mark and Luke all have this parable shows its importance and they call our different enemies by name. Satan is the one who comes and snatches away what was sown in the heart. This Evil One is not just a weakness, but an active power, a living spiritual being who perverts others, because he himself is a perverter. In his parable, Jesus refers to the “flesh” and the “world”. Our flesh is a fickle entity that has no roots, since it is the disordered interior of a human being. It either feels no need of God’s grace and so refuses to ask for it, or cannot adequately receive it. The world refers to our worldly concerns that try to seduce us by different kinds of idols and riches that close us off to salvation and plunge us into sin.

One keen strategist of this spiritual combat was Saint John of the Cross. He describes the human soul as dressed with well-chosen garments and thus free from the attacks of the Devil, the world and the flesh:

~ Faith is like an inner, dazzlingly white robe, by which the soul avoids all the trickeries of the Devil, who is our strongest and most clever enemy.

~ Hope is a second layer over the robe of faith, to protect us from our second enemy, the world, by keeping our gaze fixed on eternal life. In its light, the attractions of this world seem to dry up and become worthless.

~ Charity is like an outer garment. It completely protects any person from the attacks of the third enemy, the flesh, “for where there is true love of God, love of self and of one’s posessions finds no entry.”4 This is especially important, since our most stubborn enemy is love of the things of this world. Its attacks persist as long as self-love exists.

The Church, with its many centuries of experience down to the present day, understands this deeper meaning of our life on earth and teaches that behind suffering and death, there is a sinister person at work. The Second Vatican Council explained it:

Although humans were made by God in a state of holiness, from the very onset of their history they abused his liberty at the urging of the Evil One. They set themselves against God and sought to attain their goal apart from God…. What divine revelation makes known to us agrees with our own experience…. We are split within ourselves, and as a result, all of human life, whether individual or collective, shows itself to be a dramatic struggle between good and evil, between light and darkness. Indeed, we find that by ourselves we are incapable of battling the assaults of evil successfully, so that everyone feels bound by chains. But the Lord Himself came to free and strengthen us, renewing humankind inwardly and casting out that “ruler of this world” (Jn 12:31) who held us in the bondage of sin (Jn 8:34).5

The purpose of this book is to speak very concretely about this struggle against the evil spirit and his cohorts. The name of this fallen angel is Satan, the Devil, the Evil One, the Adversary, Enemy, Tempter, Liar and Murderer. Saint Paul says that we fight “against the Rulers, against the Authorities, against the Cosmic Powers of this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil” (Eph 6:12). Our combat is against them and not simply against flesh and blood.

The variety of names used for the evil spirits points to the fact that Christian revelation is more interested in their activity than in their nature; not so much in what they are or live, but in how they fight us, accuse us, and seduce us.6

Obviously, if we do not believe in the existence of evil spirits or fallen angels, neither will we believe in their pernicious action. These pages, however, are not for unbelievers or indifferent believers, but for those who sincerely accept the Bible’s revelation of God and the healthy tradition of the Christian Church. My hope is that anyone of good will can find something useful here, especially an explanation of certain experiences that trouble and perturb us humans.

In other words, this book is for those who sincerely try to grow in their spiritual life as integral human beings, knowing that God begins, accompanies and crowns all our work. It is not for those who are simply curious, or who constantly feed their life on earth with novelties, without really assimilating anything. On the other hand, the book is not for experts on demonology, but is rather an introduction for those who want to have some solid knowledge about the actions of the Devil and how we can defend ourselves from his trickeries.

Two advertencies con be useful here: first, the best defense against the Evil One is to know that he exists and to kill him with disdain, since he digs his own grave with the shovel of his vanity; and secondly, knowing about him is the best way to avoid both fantasies and groundless fears.

Perhaps the book’s title could provoke the question, why “Deliver us from the Evil One” and not “Deliver us from Evil”? The evil from which we want God to deliver us is, above all, a disturbing person, a fallen angel, the Evil One, the Tempter named Satan, who wants to separate us from God’s kingdom and God’s will. Sin entered into the world through this Evil One and all our misery has come through sin. In the prayer he gave us, Jesus is telling us to ask our heavenly Father to free us from Satan, as well as from all forms of evil, especially moral evil.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church says in its commentary on the Lord’s Prayer, the Our Father, “In this petition, evil is not an abstraction, but refers to a person, Satan, the Evil One, the angel who opposes God. The Devil (dia-bolos) is the one who ‘throws himself across God’s plan and his work of salvation accomplished in Christ.”7

For these different reasons, we begin by looking at the Bible and the Church’s spiritual tradition, then its theological development and official teaching. This will give us the necessary foundations for interpreting present-day demonic experiences in the light of faith.

Every extreme position has its corresponding opposite opinion and we know that a rational “minimalism”, which says that the Devil does not exist or if it exists does not act, contrasts with a “maximalist” pan-demonology. This latter tendency sees demons everywhere and forgets the influence of secondary causes, such as the flesh and the world, which enter into our temptations.

Today as always, there is a discussion about good and bad angels. The “New Age” is a notorious example of this, with the result that there can be a real danger of asserting something as part of the Church’s faith, whereas in reality it is not.

Sometimes, however, the contrary can happen and someone can overlook basic aspects of revealed truth. The truth about angels is a secondary part of divine revelation, but at the same time it is inseparable from its central truth, which is the majestic reality of God the Creator, shining forth in all of visible and invisible creation, and the equally majestic fact of God the Savior, dynamically active in human history.

As general guidelines in this, it is worth considering the following three pastoral principles:

1 The supreme role of freedom, in both the intellect and the will. This means that the Devil cannot act directly against human freedom, although he can work on the imagination and emotions, and thus influence our free will indirectly. Our freedom of conscience is the sanctuary in our heart, where we are alone with our Lord and Creator.

2 Grace and disgrace. The disgrace of our human nature results from the Devil’s action, which caused a fundamental wound in what God created as very good. Our humanity is wounded by original sin and by our own sins, weaknesses and infirmities. Just as divine grace builds on and transforms our innate human dignity, in a similar way the disgrace of the Devil’s action enters, tempts us to evil and tries to disrupt God’s plan.

3 The wisdom of gradual discernment. Wisdom requires that we first look at the circumstances and natural explanations of any phenomenon, before thinking of any preternatural intervention or the action of a pure spirit, in this case an Evil One.

4 John of the Cross, The Dark Night II, XXI, 10, in The Collected Works of Saint John of the Cross. trans. Kieran Kavanaugh and Otilio Rodriguez, O.C D. (Washington: ICS Publications, 1973), 380.

5 GS 13.

6 There is one exception to this in Sacred Scripture, in the Letter of James 2:19: “The demons believe and shudder,” which is open to different interpretations, but could easily be referring to the reaction of evil spirits when God’s name is invoked over them in exorcisms.

7 Catechism 2851.