I have a friend who doesn't go to Church for these reasons: Her mom was part of a "name it and claim it" group and ended up making some very bad choices, even dying young. And her memories of going to services involve many "fire and brimstone, you are damned!" type sermons. Looking back at our analogies in Part I, she would be like a person who went out into the sun, got sunburned when she was younger, and thought, "Well, the sun is not a safe place."
Her husband says that he believes in Christ, but carries around a heavy burden from having been raised Roman Catholic. He feels guilty about everything. God is "the big man upstairs" (I really detest that phrase, it's so inappropriate) looking over his shoulder all the time. Understandably, he's always worried he doesn't measure up. Basically, for both of them, God is perceived as Unpleasant Company. And it's a two-edged sword for them, because they do believe in Him, but they don't want to get too close. Certainly, they are not happy and secure children, playing in the sun, making sand castles and daisy crowns. (Refer back to our analogy in Part I.) They are more like people who go into their homes and shut the doors quickly, thankful that nightfall is here.
I know my friends are not the exception. And, as I've said many times before, it makes me very sad.
How did this happen? How did we end up not even recognizing our own Father?
How did we end up living in fear, and in some cases, in hatred, of the One Who loves us unfathomably?
What a tragedy of the highest magnitude. What terrible consequences there are from this.
To grasp it, for starters, we have to understand and remember that we do have an enemy, and here on earth we are free to choose our path; every day we make choices that affect our souls and our destinies. And all enemies have two things they try to employ often: Camouflage and Infiltration.
Let's first talk about camouflage. In the case of our enemy, he has tried to create a society with a lot of intellectual hubris, and which is fond of pontificating statements such as "It's very silly to believe in demons." (Feel free to put on a stuffy voice while reading that.) And, for that matter, he's tried to create a society that also believes it's silly to believe in God. Going back to the analogy we spoke about in Part I, this would be as if someone said "It's silly to believe that there is a sun and a cave, only children believe in those." Well, if one were to believe and accept that, they would lose their grip on the plain simple reality that we created in the analogy—there clearly is a sun, and it is shining and warm, and there clearly is a cave, and it is dark and cold.
So too with those who say there is no God and there are no demons. And over and over again they say "There is no evidence." Just because a person's eyes are blinded, it doesn't mean there is no evidence of the sun. And just because they grope at the walls of the cave and call them a palace, it doesn't mean there is no cave, made of dirt. There is plenty of evidence, and for those who say there is none, it begs the question: "Why are you so determined to stick to that, despite the contrary?"
If people ever tell you that it's "silly, backwards, unscientific and unproven" to believe in something we can't see, then just ask them "What is it that animates your body, that when it leaves we call that death? Is it visible?" They might say it's not visible, but we have lots of evidence that it exists because we think, we speak, we move. And their very own argument is the same with God, and with demons. One way we know of their presence is by all that we see that results from their existence and actions. (And we can talk about that more in another blog post.)
The point is, our enemy uses camouflage, so that we don't even think about the fact that we have an enemy, and then wonder in what ways the demons can be possibly affecting our thoughts, decisions and actions. So we don't ask questions like "Am I being tempted? distracted? Is this 'amazing opportunity that just came along' the best thing for my soul and my salvation?" As long as we are hum-dee-dum going along our way, the enemy doesn't have to worry about us too much. Can you imagine if all the soldiers in the foxholes were just, for instance, playing cards? They would be sitting ducks. Just where the enemy would want them.
C.S. Lewis wrote another interesting book (in addition to Mere Christianity mentioned in the Introduction) called The Screwtape Letters. In it he takes the voice of a senior demon instructing his nephew-junior demon on how to tempt and befuddle the human race at every turn. It's an interesting exposé.
Long before The Screwtape Letters was published in 1942 (and has sold millions of copies worldwide; according to some it still sells 150,000 copies each year), the Orthodox Church has always had in its treasury many beautiful writings on prayer and the spiritual life, that help us to have wisdom in our journey in this world, and to "discern the spirits". The Way of A Pilgrim and The Art of Prayer are two wonderful starting points and life long companions, and we can't recommend them enough.
So, this deals with the idea of camouflage. What about infiltration?
That is a big subject, so let's go to Part III.
Note: I once read that C. S. Lewis was asked to write a sequel to the The Screwtape Letters. Interestingly, his response was that putting his mind into that twisted place of speaking as a senior demon instructing a junior demon, was not somewhere he wanted to go again. Lewis had learned that the guarding of the mind and the soul is essential, and although The Screwtape Letters are a good exposé and very instructional to the readers, it's not surprising that Lewis did not want to spend the time it would take to write a sequel, thereby having to put his mind into that dark and diabolical role again. For those who would find it interesting, the book was dedicated to his good friend and contemporary, J.R.R.Tolkien.
Her husband says that he believes in Christ, but carries around a heavy burden from having been raised Roman Catholic. He feels guilty about everything. God is "the big man upstairs" (I really detest that phrase, it's so inappropriate) looking over his shoulder all the time. Understandably, he's always worried he doesn't measure up. Basically, for both of them, God is perceived as Unpleasant Company. And it's a two-edged sword for them, because they do believe in Him, but they don't want to get too close. Certainly, they are not happy and secure children, playing in the sun, making sand castles and daisy crowns. (Refer back to our analogy in Part I.) They are more like people who go into their homes and shut the doors quickly, thankful that nightfall is here.
I know my friends are not the exception. And, as I've said many times before, it makes me very sad.
How did this happen? How did we end up not even recognizing our own Father?
How did we end up living in fear, and in some cases, in hatred, of the One Who loves us unfathomably?
What a tragedy of the highest magnitude. What terrible consequences there are from this.
To grasp it, for starters, we have to understand and remember that we do have an enemy, and here on earth we are free to choose our path; every day we make choices that affect our souls and our destinies. And all enemies have two things they try to employ often: Camouflage and Infiltration.
Let's first talk about camouflage. In the case of our enemy, he has tried to create a society with a lot of intellectual hubris, and which is fond of pontificating statements such as "It's very silly to believe in demons." (Feel free to put on a stuffy voice while reading that.) And, for that matter, he's tried to create a society that also believes it's silly to believe in God. Going back to the analogy we spoke about in Part I, this would be as if someone said "It's silly to believe that there is a sun and a cave, only children believe in those." Well, if one were to believe and accept that, they would lose their grip on the plain simple reality that we created in the analogy—there clearly is a sun, and it is shining and warm, and there clearly is a cave, and it is dark and cold.
So too with those who say there is no God and there are no demons. And over and over again they say "There is no evidence." Just because a person's eyes are blinded, it doesn't mean there is no evidence of the sun. And just because they grope at the walls of the cave and call them a palace, it doesn't mean there is no cave, made of dirt. There is plenty of evidence, and for those who say there is none, it begs the question: "Why are you so determined to stick to that, despite the contrary?"
If people ever tell you that it's "silly, backwards, unscientific and unproven" to believe in something we can't see, then just ask them "What is it that animates your body, that when it leaves we call that death? Is it visible?" They might say it's not visible, but we have lots of evidence that it exists because we think, we speak, we move. And their very own argument is the same with God, and with demons. One way we know of their presence is by all that we see that results from their existence and actions. (And we can talk about that more in another blog post.)
The point is, our enemy uses camouflage, so that we don't even think about the fact that we have an enemy, and then wonder in what ways the demons can be possibly affecting our thoughts, decisions and actions. So we don't ask questions like "Am I being tempted? distracted? Is this 'amazing opportunity that just came along' the best thing for my soul and my salvation?" As long as we are hum-dee-dum going along our way, the enemy doesn't have to worry about us too much. Can you imagine if all the soldiers in the foxholes were just, for instance, playing cards? They would be sitting ducks. Just where the enemy would want them.
C.S. Lewis wrote another interesting book (in addition to Mere Christianity mentioned in the Introduction) called The Screwtape Letters. In it he takes the voice of a senior demon instructing his nephew-junior demon on how to tempt and befuddle the human race at every turn. It's an interesting exposé.
Long before The Screwtape Letters was published in 1942 (and has sold millions of copies worldwide; according to some it still sells 150,000 copies each year), the Orthodox Church has always had in its treasury many beautiful writings on prayer and the spiritual life, that help us to have wisdom in our journey in this world, and to "discern the spirits". The Way of A Pilgrim and The Art of Prayer are two wonderful starting points and life long companions, and we can't recommend them enough.
So, this deals with the idea of camouflage. What about infiltration?
That is a big subject, so let's go to Part III.
Note: I once read that C. S. Lewis was asked to write a sequel to the The Screwtape Letters. Interestingly, his response was that putting his mind into that twisted place of speaking as a senior demon instructing a junior demon, was not somewhere he wanted to go again. Lewis had learned that the guarding of the mind and the soul is essential, and although The Screwtape Letters are a good exposé and very instructional to the readers, it's not surprising that Lewis did not want to spend the time it would take to write a sequel, thereby having to put his mind into that dark and diabolical role again. For those who would find it interesting, the book was dedicated to his good friend and contemporary, J.R.R.Tolkien.
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