The Role of Temptation

Every First Sunday of Lent we get a gospel passage about the temptations of Jesus.  Right after his baptism in the Jordan--when, though he didn't need purification himself, he identified himself with sinful humanity--the "Spirit drove Jesus out into the desert, and he remained in the desert for forty days, tempted by Satan" (Mark 1: 12-13).  This happened right before Jesus began his public ministry of teaching and healing.  Does it surprise you that Jesus was tempted?  It shouldn't.  Temptations occur not simply because we're sinners.  They happen to those who are good, as Jesus was perfectly good.  We have an enemy who wants to knock us off the right path of doing God's will, just as he tried with Jesus.

Why does God allow temptations?  There must be something in them that is good for us. What is that?

First, humility.  God does not prevent temptation because it serves the purpose of keeping us humble.  St. Paul comes to mind. In 2 Corinthians 12 Paul writes about "a thorn in the flesh," "an angel of Satan" that afflicted him.  We are not sure exactly what this was, but it could have been a particular temptation, a moral struggle.  That makes sense given how Paul also wrote about his struggle with sin in Romans 7.  At any rate, he didn't like it at all and thought that he would be a much better apostle and person if he were rid of this "thorn."  He prayed for God to take it away.  The answer he received is a common answer to prayer--"No."  The Lord told Paul, "My grace is sufficient for you, for power is made perfect in weakness."  It is as though God told Paul that without this "thorn" he would think he was perfect. He would become puffed up and proud, self-sufficient.  This struggle brought Paul to his knees, leading him to pray and depend on God, not himself.

A second reason is that by battling temptations we exercise and grow in virtues.  A struggle with impatience is an opportunity to exercise patience which can then grow.  Virtues don't take away temptations.  They are spiritual muscles that need to be used and exercised.  Temptations give us the opportunity to do just that.  For every temptation there is an opposite virtue which God is giving us an opportunity to develop.

Thirdly, through temptation we grow in compassion, just as Jesus did.  In Hebrews 4  we hear that "we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who has similarly been tested in every way, yet without sin."  In the desert of temptation Jesus grew in the compassion that would later motivate him as he reached out to sinners.  Our temptations can similarly help us to be more compassionate to others in their struggle. "There but for the grace of God go I."

Lastly, temptations can draw us close to Jesus. If we give in to temptation and sin, we move away from Jesus who won't abandon us but will seek us because he is the Good Shepherd who cares about his lost sheep.  But if we struggle and battle temptation, despairing of our own strength and ability and turning to the Lord in our need, shouting, "Lord, save me! I am drowning!" (see Matthew 14: 22-33), he will reach out and grab us and hold us close to himself.  Sharing a struggle brings people closer to one another. Sharing our struggle with Jesus can bring us closer to the one who has also struggled against temptation and won.

Temptation is part of life, part of following Christ.  He shared our life, with all its struggles and temptations, suffering and even death itself.  He's "been there, done that."  While we may feel far from him when we are being tempted, the reality is that we are sharing in something that he himself went through.  He is close to us in temptation and he understands.

The Beginning of Lent

I led a day of recollection today for the seminarians at St. Francis de Sales Seminary in Milwaukee. It was a quiet and prayerful day and what follows is a summary of my homily.

In our first reading (Joel 2: 12-18), God tells us to return "with your whole heart" and to "rend your hearts, not your garments."  We are half-hearted.  Our hearts are divided.  We need our hearts to be healed, to be made whole.  We need to open our hearts to God so that the Holy Spirit may pierce and soften these sin-hardened hearts.

What divides our hearts?  What hardens them?  The self-centeredness of sin.

Last week the first readings at Mass were from Genesis, the story of the first temptation and sin.  Our ancestral parents had hearts open to God, but fear and mistrust closed and hardened them. They were tempted to believe the serpent who suggested that God might not be telling them the truth when warning them that the fruit of a certain tree would bring death. They mistrusted God and thought it would be better to be independent, to get control, to be like gods who could determine for themselves what was right and what was wrong, what was good and what was bad.

They ate and the effect was immediate. They felt shame in each other's presence.  They were no longer open to each other but covered themselves. When God came for their daily stroll, they hid.  The man's response shows the self-centeredness that began the hardening of his heart, closing him off from God and the woman. He said: "I heard you in the garden; but I was afraid, because I was naked, so I hid myself.  Me, me, me.  The world now revolved around him.

Then, when God pointed out that this response clearly indicated he'd eaten of the fruit, the man responded, "It was the woman you put here...."  He blamed his partner and God.  Turned in on himself, the man turned against God and his neighbor.

Sin works the same way in our lives.

Those who work in the Church and offer their lives in service of others are not immune from sinful self-centeredness.  It creeps into our relationship with God and into ministry. In the Gospel (Matthew 6: 1-6, 16-18), Jesus warns against "righteous deeds" which are done to gain others' attention and affirmation.

We need this time of Lent for conversion.  Our divided hearts, which seem to be serving God while all the while serving themselves, need to be made whole and undivided.  We need this time to develop hearts like the Heart of Jesus which he described as "meek and humble."  Humble hearts don't pray and serve in order to receive glory.  They give and serve without seeking a reward because they are motivated by love.

Jesus was so in touch with the infinite love of the Father that he was free to love totally with great freedom, with a whole and undivided heart.  Knowing the love of the Father, he, in the words of our second reading (2 Corinthians 5: 20 - 6: 2) became sin.  Just as he reached into the isolation of the leper in last Sunday's Gospel (Mark 1: 40-45), touched him, and made himself unclean in the process, so Jesus reached into human darkness and took upon himself the sins of the world when he was nailed to a cross.  With his attention focused totally on the God and those whom God sent him to save, Jesus made a total offering of himself.

Now he calls us to renounce the self-centeredness of sin that hardens and closes our hearts. We begin this time of purification and healing by remembering that we are dust. We are not God.  We are not in control.  Nor do we have forever for our hearts to be made more like the Heart of Jesus.  "Behold, now is a very acceptable time; behold now is the day of salvation."

The Meaning of Ashes

It's Ash Wednesday, the day on which I like to say that the Church puts death right in our face. We tend to avoid any thoughts of death, living as though this life on earth will go on forever. We know it won't, but we don't like to think about its end, our end.  But facing the fact that our life on earth will one day end can give perspective to how we live this life.  It can put us in touch with our end, our goal and purpose. Sin is what ultimately gets in the way of our attaining the purpose for which we were created--union with God and communion with all God's children.  Sin is what disrupts and even negates God's plan for humanity.  Sin is disorder.

That is the title of Mr. Jacob Boddicker's reflection for the Magis Center for Catholic Spirituality. Jacob is a Jesuit scholastic who is finishing his regency--that period of ministry in a young Jesuit's formation between his philosophy and theology studies.  God-willing, Jacob will leave the high school classroom where he teaches and head off to theological studies next year.  I think that his periodic daily reflections reveal the promise that he shows of being a great Jesuit communicator, both in the printed and written word. 

And so with gratitude to God for calling this fine young man to the Society of Jesus, I share his reflection for Ash Wednesday:

Sin is disorder.

Lent is an opportunity for us to repent and re-order our lives to God. The first words of Scripture we hear today reflect this reality: Even now, says the LORD, return to me with your whole heart, with fasting, and weeping, and mourning. Why such things? They remind us that we do not live on "bread alone" (Matthew 4: 4) and that it is God who fills us with joy and peace (Romans 15: 13). By fasting, by accepting our deep need for God we return to the natural order of things and find peace for, as St. Augustine has said, "Peace is the tranquility of order." When all is right in the world, when we let God be God, we find peace and plenty for if God is our first desire, we are filled.

It is interesting, then, that so many Catholics who have in many respects turned away from their faith choose this day to return. There is something about the ritual of the ashes and the mark upon the forehead that draws them back. Some say they see it as an opportunity to publically announce their identity as Catholics; some just find the ritual of it to be otherwise rewarding. But what is really happening here.

God has burned down the Tree of Eden in the fire of His love and, scooping up the ashes He puts us in our place, as He did when He planted that Tree in the beginning. He does this through His Church whose ministers trace with the ashes the mark of the New and Everlasting Tree; He does this with the solemn reminder of who we are: "Remember you are dust, and to dust you shall return."

Ash Wednesday is the day of all days that we remember who we truly are: creatures of God, not gods ourselves as was the first sin. We reject our self-idolatry and publically profess that God is God and we are not; is there any more radical statement we could make in the world today? Let this cross of ashes crucify our pride, and let us not forget the profound and fundamental truth that it proclaims: we are not God but are His creatures, fashioned from the dust of the earth. Yet though our first ancestors ate from the Tree of Eden and died, we are given a new Tree upon which hangs the Fruit of the Virgin's Womb, "the food that endures for eternal life."(John 6: 27) As we fast from the world let us feast upon the goodness of the Lord, who, for love of us, gives His very self as our food and drink.

Lent and Freedom

I celebrated Mass this afternoon at Mercy Academy. Before leaving the office to head over there, I asked Fr. Phil, the Apostleship of Prayer's Director of Youth and Young Adult Ministry, what he had preached about earlier. His thoughts led me to change what I'd planned on saying.

I ended up talking about freedom and how the three young men who had been thrown into the furnace (see Daniel 3) were seen "unfettered," walking about in the fire.  They were alive and free.  But before being thrown into the furnace they were free in the way that is most important. They were free to follow the truth. They were free from the fear of a fiery death, the punishment inflicted upon them for not worshiping a gold statue. The truth--as Jesus said in the gospel (John 8: 31-42)--made them free. It is the truth that there is one God and that this life is not the only life.  Freedom means living in that truth.

The world thinks of freedom in a very different way. It sees freedom as being able to do whatever one wants whenever one wants.  But such worldly freedom can lead to the slavery of sin. It can lead to attachments and addictions that ironically take one's freedom away.  It means embracing a lie about what is truly good for the human person.

Lent is a time to grow in freedom, the freedom to become the persons God created us to be.  When we give something up for Lent we exercise the discipline that helps us to be free of those things that can get in the way of our relationship with God, that hinder our becoming as free as the three young men who were cast into the furnace. 

I asked the children at Mass today if any of them had given something up for Lent.  One boy said that he had given up "electronics," something that can definitely become a compulsion in our world today.  I asked him if it had been hard and he responded with a resounding "yes."  Then I called on a girl who said that she had given up "whining" for Lent. That got a laugh from many of the other children and especially the adults who were present.  Some of the things we give up for Lent, like electronics, are things that we can go back to when Lent is over, and we do so with perhaps a bit more freedom because we've exercised some discipline.  But other things, like whining, are things that we hopefully won't return to when Lent is over.

Who knows... maybe, in a couple weeks, that boy will find an electronic game in his Easter basket, but I definitely think that girl won't find "whine" there and she may have to exercise some more discipline if she doesn't find what she was hoping for!

Our Interconnectedness

Lent is off to a busy start. On Ash Wednesday I gave a talk to the Mother's Guild at my Alma Mater, Marquette University High School, and this past weekend I began a mission at St. Dominic's Church in nearby Brookfield, Wisconsin. On Sunday I also squeezed into the afternoon two talks on the subject of "Reparation" at the annual Lenten Afternoon of Recollection for the local chapter of Catholics United for the Faith. One good thing about giving talks like these is that it gives me material to share on this blog.

On the First Sunday of Lent we always have the story of Jesus' temptations in the desert. This year the first reading that accompanied that Gospel was the story of the first temptation in Genesis 3. The second reading from Romans 5 was the perfect accompaniment to both these readings. But there is something in all this that I used to protest against when I was young. Why did I have to suffer for the sin of Adam and Eve? Why did I have to suffer the consequences or effects of their sin? Why is there Original Sin? I could see why we call that first sin of our ancestral parents the "Original Sin," but why did I have to inherit it? St. Paul wrote that "by the transgression of the one, the many died," and that "by the transgression of the one, death came to reign through that one." It just didn't seem fair that "through the disobedience of the one man the many were made sinners."

I've come to see that lurking behind this question is sin--the sin of individualism. The fact of the matter is that there is no individual sin. What I do affects everyone else. It's false to justify sin by saying, "Well, I'm only hurting myself."

How is it that my sin affects others? First, humanity, according to Genesis, was made in the image and likeness of God. God is a Trinity of Persons, a Communion of Love and therefore Love Itself. We are not individuals isolated from one another but persons created for communion. To say that what I do only affects or hurts me is to deny who I am and who I am called to be.

Another way of looking at this is to think of the solidarity of the human family. God is the Creator and Father of this family. We are related to one another as children of the One Father. What one person does in this family affects the life of the family, for good or for ill.

Finally, as Christians we have been baptized into the Body of Christ. We are now not isolated individuals but interconnected parts. As Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians Chapter 12, describing the Body of Christ that we are: "If one part suffers, all the parts suffer with it; if one part is honored, all the parts share its joy" (verse 26). We know from experience how one cell in the physical body can harm and destroy the entire body. A cancer cell is one that has gone wild, that no longer serves the good of the body but grows and spreads. All it takes is one cell. In terms of the spiritual body that we are, this is even more the case. We are each cells in the Body of Christ and when one cell insists on its "will" rather than the good of the whole, rather than the will of the Head, the Body becomes sick.

So, while it doesn't seem fair that the one sin of our ancestral parents should be passed on to every generation, it's the reality of how things work in the interconnectedness of the human family made in the image and likeness of God, the Blessed Trinity.

But this is less than half the story, for the interconnectedness works the other way as well. Good cells affect the health of the entire Body. Jesus, as the Head of the Body, who came to repair the damage of the Original Sin, has done something that affects every human. In the Second Reading from Sunday's Mass, St. Paul writes: "But the gift is not like the transgression. For it by the transgression of the one, the many died, how much more did the grace of God and the gracious gift of the one man Jesus Christ overflow for the many. And the gift is not like the result of the one who sinned."

Lent is a time for each of us, individual cells in the Body of Christ, to grow in our union with our Head, Jesus. It's a time to make sure that the flow of Life from the Vine to the branches (see John 15) is clear and strong.

Can We Have Fun?

Every month I'm a guest on Relevant Radio's daily call-in spiritual direction show "The Inner Life," hosted by Chuck Neff. Last week the producer wrote me about the topic for today's show and wondered if I wanted to talk about Lent. My first reaction was "No! We're going to have 40 days of Lent. No need to start it early." Instead, I thought it would be good to talk about Mardi Gras or Fat Tuesday or, as it's often called in the Polish community of Milwaukee, Paczki Day. Is it OK for Christians to have fun?

Of course! Jesus had fun. Unfortunately much of our religious art makes Jesus look as though he never cracked a smile and never laughed. He appears very somber and even scarey. But this can't be the way Jesus really was. No one would want to go near Him. Certainly not the children. Yet Jesus attracted droves of people to Himself. So Jesus must have smiled, laughed, had a good time, and genuinely enjoyed life. He even described heaven in terms of a big party or wedding feast and when He participated in a feast where the wine had run out, He made more.

But what about "Fat Tuesday" and all the excesses we see? The tradition of over-indulging seems to have arisen from the logic that since we're going to have to fast and pray and go to confession, now's the time to party. This isn't really the best way to enter into Lent.

While Lent is a more somber and subdued time, a time when we see the color violet at Mass and don't sing "Alleluia" or "The Gloria," it's supposed to be a happy season. The Preface for Lent I which precedes the Eucharistic Prayer at Mass addresses the Father and says, "Each year you give us this joyful season when we prepare to celebrate the paschal mystery with mind and heart renewed." The Preface for Lent II has: "This great season of grace is your gift to your family to renew us in spirit." Do you think of Lent as a "joyful season," a "gift"? How can fasting and penance and sacrifice be joyful?

Our fasting with its accompanying hunger reminds us of our hunger for God. It's a way that we pray with our bodies as well as our minds. It shouldn't make us irritable and grumpy. If it does, then it would be better for us not to fast, for spiritual exercises that don't lead to greater charity are useless. As St. Paul wrote in his famous chapter on love, 1 Corinthians 13, without love we are nothing. Without charity our knowledge and faith and even our martyrdom, should we be so called, are nothing.

True fasting and prayer should make us more aware that nothing on earth can ultimately satisfy us. We're made for union with God and while the things of earth may take away the hunger pains for a while, they ultimately don't satisfy. Our physical hunger should remind us of our spiritual hunger. We are, as St. Augustine famously wrote, made for God and so our hearts are restless until they rest in Him.

It all comes down to balance. Christians, following Jesus' example, enjoy life and its legitimate pleasures. Sin may make us feel good for a while but ultimately it's a poison that destroys us and others. It's OK to have fun today, to eat those wonderful Polish fruit-filled doughnuts known as Paczki. Have fun and give glory to God. Follow St. Paul's example, eating and drinking and giving glory to God who wants to be a part of every moment of your life. But don't go overboard for that will only lead to unhappiness.

St. Ignatius of Loyola counsels in a similar vein in the First Principle and Foundation of his "Spiritual Exercises." All earthly things and pleasures are given to us to help us attain the end for which we were created--the praise, reverence, and service of God--our salvation, our union with God who alone fills the restless heart. Thus we should use the good things of the earth in so far as they help us attain our end and we should reject them in so far as they get in the way of our attaining our end. This is real balance. Lent is a time to grow in this balance and that growth is what makes it a "gift" and a "joyful season."