Archbishop Fulton J.Sheen: Have you been tempted more lately?

Spiritual Warfare: Know your enemy

The following comes from Aggie Catholics:

There is a spiritual battle that rages in places we cannot see with our eyes or hear with our ears. It rages in our hearts, our culture, and in our world.

In the Sacred Scriptures God continually warns His people to prepare for war. Yes, He is The victorious King who has entered the fray, but he calls you and I to take up our weapons and fight with Him against the enemy - Satan.

All of hell knows there is no hope of final victory, but out of spite, they fight to ruin whatever souls they can. The rest of creation cries out for salvation.

Our war will not be fought with weapons made of our own hands, but of the grace of God.

How have you prepared for war this day?
What are you doing to help others survive it?
Are you prepared to go into battle?
Whether you are or not, war is upon you.

Now is the time to fight. Now is the time to put on the armor of God and take up the sword.

If we fail to pick a side in the war, it means we have already chosen - "he who is not with me is against me."

Can you not hear the bombs falling and the guns firing? Pick up your cross - it is your weapon against the enemy - and follow The King of All into battle.

He will come again, but until that day - it is up to you and me to take up His cause and fight the enemy.

If you want to fight - here are a 9 strategies in fighting the war: 9 Ways to Overcome Temptation: 

1. Avoid and/or flee from it. Sometimes discretion is the better part of valor.

“She caught him by his cloak and said, "Come to bed with me!" But he left his cloak in her hand and ran out of the house.” -Gen 39:12

2. Submit your thoughts to God. He knows better than we do what is good.

“Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things.” -Phil 4:8

3. Overcome your selfishness. True Love doesn’t know selfishness. Because, if you love Jesus you don’t belong to yourself

“and you are of Christ, and Christ is of God.” -1 Cor 3:23

4. Expect and be ready for temptation. We need to be prepared for Spiritual battle.

“Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand.” -Eph 6:13

5. Remind yourself of the consequences of sin.

“The acts of the sinful nature are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity and debauchery; idolatry and witchcraft; hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions and envy; drunkenness, orgies, and the like. I warn you, as I did before, that those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of God.” -Gal5:19-21

6. Memorize God’s Word. Filling our minds with the thoughts of God and having them readily available to us is very wise.

“He replied, "Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and obey it.” -Luke 11:28

7. Cultivate a sense of God’s presence But don’t just listen – obey.

“Go near and listen to all that the LORD our God says. Then tell us whatever the LORD our God tells you. We will listen and obey.” -Deut 5:27

8. Frequent confession heals us and we start over spiritually healthy.

“Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective.” -James 5:16

9. Accountability helps us avoid sin. When we are accountable to both man and God it helps us overcome temptation.

“Then the LORD said to Cain, "Where is your brother Abel?" "I don't know," he replied. "Am I my brother's keeper?" The LORD said, "What have you done? Listen! Your brother's blood cries out to me from the ground.” -Genesis 4:9-10

Is there more to Lent than just giving up the stuff that you love?

The following comes from NOLA.com:

Open the Bible and you won’t find the word “Lent” anywhere. So where does Lent come from? Why does it last for 40 days — 40 long days? And what exactly are we supposed to be doing? Is it really just about giving up coffee, chocolate and Coke? Or is there more to it?

The answers can be found by exploring the biblical roots of the season. Every year on Ash Wednesday, we read Jesus’ teaching about prayer, fasting and almsgiving (Matthew 6:1-18). And every year, on the first Sunday of Lent, we read about Jesus’ 40 days in the desert (Matthew 4:1-11; Mark 1:12-15; Luke 4:1-13).

First, the 40 days of Lent are modeled on Jesus’ 40 days of fasting in the desert: “At that time Jesus was led by the Spirit into the desert to be tempted by the devil. He fasted for forty days and forty nights, and afterward he was hungry” (Matthew 4:1). I bet he was! Here we see the deepest reason for the Lenten season: the 40 days of self-denial are done in imitation of Jesus. He prayed and fasted 40 days, so we follow his example with 40 days of self-denial. Now, we could just stop there. And many people do. But there is more to Lent than just “giving up” food and drink. For Jesus not only fasts, he also overcomes three powerful temptations:

The devil tries to get Jesus to transform stones into loaves of bread (Matthew 4:1-4). The temptation is for Jesus to break his fast and satisfy his hunger, which by this point must be ravenous.

The devil offers to give Jesus “all the kingdoms of the world in their magnificence” if Jesus will bow down and worship him (Matthew 4:8-10). Here the devil tries to tempt Jesus by offering him possession of the kingdoms of the world, which were handed over to the devil by Adam in the Fall (see Luke 4:6).

Finally, the devil tries to get Jesus to “prove” he is really the Son of God by throwing himself down from “the parapet of the Temple” in Jerusalem and letting the angels catch him. Here the devil tries to tempt Jesus to perform a miracle that everyone would be able to see.

Of course, Jesus rebuffs each temptation by declaring that a person lives by the word of God, not by bread alone; that God alone is to be worshipped, and that one should not put God to the test. But why these temptations? Why does the Gospel tell us that “when the devil had ended every temptation, he departed from (Jesus) until an opportune time” (Luke 4:13)?

Read the rest here.

Trade Secret

Taking the Devil Seriously

The following comes from God and the Machine: 

The reality of the devil was one of the hardest things for me to accept when I returned to the Church. When I made my choice to assent and submit to all the Church teaches, I knew I had a long road ahead of me. I knew that much pride and intellectual vanity and modernist funk would have to be scraped away before I could conform myself fully to the Church.

This process of death to self and the world in order to allow a new life in the Spirit to take root is not easy, and indeed it is ongoing. Each Catholic is in a different places in his or her journey. If you would have questioned me about my faith in my early 20s, I would have dismissed many key elements of Church teachings and sounded like a typical cafeteria Catholic. Faith is not a static thing. It’s organic. It has its seasons of growth and seasons where it seems to lay fallow.

And we all have those weaker moments. Not moments of disbelief, necessarily, but of weakness, of a lessening ardor, of a gentle fading of the passion for the Lord. The distractions and pressures of the world batter us and threaten to push faith to the fringes.

That’s the place where Satan wants us. When we aren’t looking, when we are distracted, when we are weak or sick in body or mind, when we have doubts: those are moments for him to do his work.

Families are organic, and thus they, too, have their cycles from fallow to fruiting. The Church is always under attack, from within and without, and the family is an image of the Church. Why think it could be any less under attack? One look around us shows a society where the meaning of marriage has collapsing. Gay marriage didn’t do it. That was just a final bullet to the head after the damage wrought by no-fault divorce and other family-destroying policies and social trends.

So when Francis speaks of the family being under attack by the Devil, he’s speaking a truth more need to hear:

 Families are the home Church where Jesus grows. He grows in the spouses’ love and in the children’s lives. For this reason, the enemy attacks the family so much. The devil does not want it. He tries to destroy it, to prevent love from becoming free. Families are the home church. But married people are sinners like everyone else, they do not want to go in faith, in its fertility, in children and the faith of their children. May the Lord bless the family, and make it strong in the face of the crisis by which the devil wants to destroy it.

We need to start acting like the devil is real and threatening, particularly in our families. The Church cannot stand without the family. One is a reflection of the other.

The problem is that we don’t like to think about demonic activity in our world, and we certainly don’t like to talk about it. When was the last time you ever heard Satan mentioned in a homily? I don’t think I ever have. The recent controversy about the Black Mass at Harvard pushed it forward and forced us to deal discuss it in the open, and we shouldn’t let that moment go to waste.

Read the rest here.

Pope Francis: Satan exists in the 21st century and how we can fight him

(Vatican Radio) Pope Francis said Satan exists in our present century and we must learn from the Gospel how to fight against his temptations. This was the core message of his homily at the Mass celebrated on Friday in the Santa Marta residence.
Pope Francis said the life of every Christian is a constant battle against evil just as Jesus during his life had to struggle against the devil and his many temptations. And he warned that whoever wants to follow Jesus must be aware of this reality.
“We too are tempted, we too are the target of attacks by the devil because the spirit of Evil does not want our holiness, he does not want our Christian witness, he does not want us to be disciples of Christ. And what does the Spirit of Evil do, through his temptations, to distance us from the path of Jesus? The temptation of the devil has three characteristics and we need to learn about them in order not to fall into the trap. What does Satan do to distance us from the path of Jesus? Firstly, his temptation begins gradually but grows and is always growing. Secondly, it grows and infects another person, it spreads to another and seeks to be part of the community. And in the end, in order to calm the soul, it justifies itself. It grows, it spreads and it justifies itself.”
Turning to the bible, the Pope recalled how Jesus’s first temptation by Satan was almost ‘like a seduction.’ Satan told Jesus to throw himself down from the Temple so that all the people will see that he is the Messiah! And warned the Pope, when the devil is rejected, he grows and comes back stronger than before. Jesus himself noted this in the gospel when the devil went around looking for companions and with them returned to Jesus. Satan got involved with Jesus’s enemies and what seemed at first like a calm trickle of water turned into a flood of water. In this way, the temptation grows, infects others and justifies itself. As an illustration, the Pope recalled how when Jesus preached in the synagogue, his enemies belittled him by saying “but isn’t this the son of Joseph, the carpenter, the son of Mary. He never studied so with what authority can he speak?
“We have a temptation that grows: it grows and infects others. For example, let’s look at gossip: I’m a bit envious of this or that person and at first I’m just envious inside and I need to share it and go to another person and say: “But have you seen that person?’.. and this gossip tries to grow and infects another and another… This is the way gossip works and all of us have been tempted to gossip! Maybe not one of you, if you’re a saint , but I too have been tempted to gossip! It’s a daily temptation. And it begins in this way, discreetly, like a trickle of water. It grows by infecting others and in the end it justifies itself.”
Pope Francis concluded by urging people to be vigilant and not to give in to that initial temptation and thus allow it to spread to others and justify itself.
“We are all tempted because the law of our spiritual life, our Christian life is a struggle: a struggle. That’s because the Prince of this world, Satan, doesn’t want our holiness, he doesn’t want us to follow Christ. Maybe some of you might say: ‘But Father, how old fashioned you are to speak about the devil in the 21st century!’ But look out because the devil is present! The devil is here… even in the 21st century! And we mustn’t be naïve, right? We must learn from the Gospel how to fight against Satan.”

Finding the motivation to go to mass…

The following comes from The Crescat:

… This past Sunday morning was abysmal. Cold, grey, and rainy. The kind of morning that begs for sleeping late. I laid there for awhile trying to will myself to get up out of bed and push past the beginnings of a migraine.

I had almost convinced myself that this little act of willful laziness was completely harmless and perfectly understandable. It was a headache, for crying out loud. Can’t go to mass with a headache.

And then I remembered him. The man at church that sometimes catches my eye. He’s hard to miss and ever so dashing in his impeccable suit. Just the kind of motivation a girl needs to drag her listless body from the covers.

The gentleman I refer to is an elderly Veteran who’s missing a leg. I see him from time to time, with his portable oxygen tank slung over his shoulder.

Like a boss. A serious boss.

I’m sure you’ve got similar motivation in your own parish. They’re there every week despite crippling arthritis, shuffling along behind their walkers or being wheeled in by a family member. These champions of fortitude. These witnesses to a lifetime of faith.

Yes, sometimes they whisper too loudly and can be fiercely territorial when it comes to “their pew”, but they’ve earned their place and I love to see them there every week. Don’t ever treat the elderly in your parish contemptuously. Love them.

If it weren’t for them, representing and showing us young folks how it’s done, I could easily talk myself out of attending mass for the slightest ailment. I’m that convincing. And that lazy. Mostly just lazy though.

Some people, and you know who they are, like to point to the elderly population of a parish as evidence that the Church is dying. Or at least that particular parish is. But don’t you listen to them. Everyone serves a purpose and anyone can be an example. Remember, we don’t go to mass for ourselves.

I just pray that when I get older I’ll be at least half as determined and devoted to my church and God as the dashing old gentleman that puts most young men to shame.

The Subtleties of Satan

The following comes from Fr. Dwight Longenecker:

Are demons and angels real?

There are an increasing numbers of new stories about exorcism and the reality of the demonic. I wrote recently on how the demonic may be manifested in many ways other than the obviously shocking stuff of the exorcism movies. The Devil in Ordinary told the story of a guy I met who was outwardly normal, but there was another quality to him which lurked beneath the surface which seemed diabolical.

As a Catholic priest I do not come across many instances of horrible demonic possession in the classic sense. However, I do come across many situations with very ordinary people where there is an irrational level of evil in their lives.

In many ways the classic examples of demonic possession are counter productive. They certainly make us aware that the devil is real, but they disguise the fact that the reality of evil is present in many other ways. If we are not careful we will conclude that the only time the devil is present is when a little girl’s head spins backward, she vomits nails, talks like Darth Vader and walks up the wall.

In my experience it is far more likely that the diabolical is insinuated into ordinary lives in far more subtle ways. Isn’t that what we would expect from the Father of Lies, the Great Serpent? What I mean is that Satan is more likely to control certain parts of our lives–claiming certain areas for his own which we have yielded to him. I envision him like a constrictor serpent wound tightly around certain parts of our lives–not letting go, hoping bit by bit to take control of our will completely until we are ruined.

Let me give you an example. I worked with a young man who had given in to pornography and sexual promiscuity. When we began to do some spiritual work, in this area he had a complete blind spot. He wanted to grow in grace, but really could not see the sin problem. When I insisted the rage emerged and it was extraordinary and frightening to see. He actually looked at me in a weird way. His eyes slanted and he exhaled through his teeth like a hiss. It only lasted for a moment, but something else was there.

Full scale exorcism was not necessary. Here was a man who went to confession and Mass regularly and seemed to be a good Christian. Nevertheless, something else was operating. There was a portion of his life that was not redeemed and a battle was going on for his soul.

This was not demonic possession as such, but what is sometimes called “obsession”. It is like the person has been infected with a virus that is working in the body as an alien agent and causing sickness, but not death.

I am convinced that this sort of demonic infection is very common and increasing. So what to do about it?

Regular unrelenting confession is the first remedy. Repentance and a complete and open examination of conscience. If this can be done with a spiritual director-priest even better. Secondly, I think we should consider what I called “self deliverance”. This is a way of using our prayer life to consciously name and expel the demonic influences. Reciting the Lord’s Prayer slowly with a focus on “deliver us from evil” is a powerful remedy. The use of holy water, scapulars, blessed candles, images and other sacramentals are useful. Finally, a real, conscious concentration on the presence of the Lord Jesus and his holy name in the Eucharist can help to drive out the demonic that exists in our ordinary lives.

I realize critics will sneer that my approach is medieval and superstitious and that I am seeing devils hiding under every bed. Not so. I am pretty down to earth about these matters. In fact, I am also prepared to accept that these influences are not objectively demonic. They might be. They might not.

It is practical good sense, however, to view them as demonic. It helps us to identify the problem, name it and cast it out. So, for example, a person may be struggling with alcoholism and they may call it “the demon drink”. The problem may have a demonic dimension or it may not. It doesn’t really matter. What matters is that the person sees the problem as a real objective problem and takes positive steps to expel the “demon.”

This would seem to put the whole matter into the realm of “practical ritual” and “useful symbolic language”–a mindset that denies the objective reality of the demonic. It needn’t. One can affirm the positive value of “practical ritual” and “symbolic language” while remaining agnostic about the objective reality of the demonic in particular cases.

The bottom line is that it is better to believe in the demonic and deal with pastoral cases as if it is real than not to.

It is better to remember that our adversary the devil is stalking about like a roaring lion seeking whom he may devour….

And to be on guard.

Pope Francis: resist temptation by listening to Jesus' Word

(Vatican Radio) Resisting the seduction of temptation is possible only “when listening to the Word of Jesus.” Those were the words of Pope Francis in his homily at the Mass this morning at Casa Santa Marta. Despite our weaknesses, the Pope repeated, Christ always gives us “confidence” and opens to us a horizon wider than our limitations.
Temptation manifests itself as a harmless attraction and ends up turning into a cage. Rather than trying to escape, more often we try to minimize the slavery, being deaf to the Word of God. In his homily, Pope Francis reaffirms a truth and a sequence described by St. James in the day’s reading. The truth is that man is tempted not by God, but by his passions. The sequence is produced by the same passions, which, the Apostle says, “conceive and produce sin. And sin, once committed, brings forth death”:
“Where does temptation come from? How does it work in us? The Apostle tells us that it is not from God, but from our passions, our inner weaknesses, from the wounds left in us by original sin: that’s where temptations come from, from these passions. It’s curious... temptation has three characteristics: it grows, is contagious and is justified. It grows: it begins with a tranquil air, and grows ... Jesus himself said this when He spoke about the parable of the wheat and the tares. The wheat grew, but so did the weeds sown by the enemy. And the temptation grows: it grows, it grows... And if one does not stop it, it fills everything.”
Further, Pope Francis continued, the temptation “looks for another to keep it company, it is contagious” and “in growing, in being contagious, the temptation closes us in in an environment where you can’t get out easily.” This is the experience of the Apostles related in the Gospel of the day, where the Twelve blame each other under the eyes of the Master for not having brought bread on board the boat. Jesus, the Pope said, perhaps smiling at the quarrel, invites them to watch out for “the leaven of the Pharisees, of Herod.” But the Apostles, who, not listening to Him, continued to argue, were “so closed in on the issue of who was to blame for not having brought the bread, that they did not have space, the time, the light for the Word of God”:
"And so, when we are tempted, we do not hear the Word of God, we don’t hear. We don’t understand. And Jesus had to remind them of the multiplication of the loaves to get them out of that environment, because temptation closes us in, it takes away any ability to see ahead, it closes every horizon, and so leads us to sin. When we are tempted, only the Word of God, the Word of Jesus saves us, hearing that Word that opens the horizon... He is always willing to teach us how to escape from temptation. And Jesus is great because He not only brings us out of temptation, but gives us more confidence.”
This confidence, the Pope says, is “a great strength when we are tempted: the Lord waits for us... trusts us who are so tempted, who are sinners... He always opens horizons.” On the other hand, Pope Francis said, the devil, “ with temptation, closes, closes, closes” and makes an environment similar to the boat of the Apostles. And not to be “imprisoned” by this type of environment, he concluded, is possible only “when listening to the Word of Jesus”:
“Let us ask the Lord, who always — as He did with the disciples, with his patience — when we are tempted, tells us: ‘Stop, don’t worry. Remember what I did with you at that moment, at that time: remember. Lift up your eyes, look at the horizon, do not be closed, do not close in on yourself, go forward.’ And this Word will save us from falling into sin in the moment of temptation."

Ralph Martin on Pope Francis, the Devil, and Us

The following comes from Ralph Martin: 

The world’s press and the blogosphere have been abuzz for several months now with comments on how frequently Pope Francis talks about our enemy, the devil. Not only does he talk frequently about the devil, but he talks in such a way that indicates he actually believes in the devil’s existence and daily relevance to each of our lives — as should all faithful and well-formed Catholics.

There has been such an atmosphere of skepticism in the world, and in some places in the Church, about what could be called the “biblical world view” — what Jesus and the Apostles actually believed about the world — that Pope Francis’ frequent comments on the reality of the devil come across to many as shocking. But belief in the devil and his work to destroy souls is an integral part of the biblical revelation and is authoritatively taught by the Church (see Catechism of the Catholic Church, 391-395).


Why Pope Francis speaks about the devil with the frequency that he does perhaps can be traced to a few special factors. Pope Francis is a Jesuit, and an integral part of Jesuit formation is the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius, where meditation on the reality of Satan and the need to discern and resist his works it plays an important role. Discerning the work of the evil one, the work of the human spirit, and the work of the Holy Spirit is foundational for Jesuit spirituality.

Perhaps another reason that Pope Francis speaks about the devil with such frequency is that he is discerning the devil’s work in the world today and in the lives of individuals and knows that unless we advert to this reality we won’t utilize the means necessary to defeat the devil’s work.

While still Archbishop of Buenos Aires, he discerned the hand of Satan behind the attack on marriage, an attack that is still being carried out with unusual hostility and rapidity in many countries today. When a law in favor of same-sex “marriage” was proposed in 2010 (and later passed) in Argentina, he said:

At stake is the total rejection of God’s law engraved in our hearts. Let us not be naive: this is not simply a political struggle, but it is an attempt to destroy God’s plan. It is not just a bill… but a move of the Father of Lies who seeks to confuse and deceive the children of God.

He also has identified the devil’s work in discouragement, hopelessness, in the profound deception of thinking one’s darkness is actually light, in the calumny that destroys people and reputations and in the hostility towards Christians which is producing in our time more martyrs than at any time in Christian history.

What then are the means that the Lord has given us to recognize and defeat the work of the devil in our own lives? Some of the most helpful biblical teaching on this is contained in Ephesians, where we are told that our battle is not just against flesh and blood but against the powers and principalities, the “world rulers of this present darkness, with the evil spirits in the heavens.” Because this is the case we are told to “put on the whole armor of God that you may be able to resist on the evil day, and having done everything, to hold your ground.” (cf. Eph 6:10-20)

What is this armor that is needed to resist evil and hold our ground? It is truth; it is holiness; it is clarity about salvation; it is commitment to mission, to knowing and utilizing the Word of God. Not only to defend ourselves from the lies of the evil one but to speak words of truth that set other people free from demonic deception and bondage.

In this short article, though, there is one part of the spiritual armor, the “shield of faith,” that I would particularly like to comment on.

The shield of faith is given to us to “quench all the flaming arrows of the evil one.” What are these flaming arrows? They are the temptations, the lies, the seductions of the demons intended to draw us away from God and the way that leads to salvation. Faith has a two-fold meaning. On the one hand faith is that complete trust and surrender to God which knows him to be all good and worthy of all our adoration and obedience — that friendship with Christ, that personal relationship, about which recent Popes have spoken so frequently. And a key to discerning what is from God and what is from the enemy is familiarity with the “voice” of the Lord through a relationship that grows in depth and intimacy through prayer, that “praying at all times in the Spirit,” that Ephesians urges us to. On the other hand faith is those truths revealed to us that are necessary for our salvation concerning, Christ, the Church, and the life of holiness that leads to the beatitude of heaven. These truths also contain clear and explicit warnings about what will exclude us from the kingdom. The devil is particularly interested in deceiving us in these areas which is why St. Paul so explicitly and repeatedly warns us in his First Letter to the Corinthians:

Do you not know that the immoral will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived; neither fornicators nor idolaters nor adulterers nor those who practice homosexuality nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor robbers will inherit the kingdom of God. (1 Cor 6:9-10)

Similar lists are to be found in Galatians, Ephesians and Revelation.

Unfortunately, many of our fellow Catholics don’t know that a spiritual battle is being waged against them and haven’t availed themselves of the spiritual armor that can protect them and enable them to help set others free. Many of our fellow Catholics are drifting along with the culture, believing whatever they hear from the most foolish sources, moving along on that wide and easy path that leads to destruction (see Mt. 7: 13-14). The “flaming darts” of the enemy are entering many of our fellow Catholics, planting lies, sowing suspicion, stirring up disordered desires, and presenting rationalizations for sinful behavior.

While the primary foundation for engaging successfully in this spiritual warfare is contained in these texts we have just considered, Pope Francis has pointed out to us some additional special helps we have as Catholics that we need to have recourse to in these challenging times.

This past summer, Pope Francis and Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI together consecrated the Vatican to St. Joseph and St. Michael the Archangel. Pope Francis asked for St. Joseph’s fatherly protection over each of us and over the whole Church, and he invoked the protection of St. Michael the Archangel against the “enemy par excellence, the devil,” asking St. Michael “to defend us from the evil one and banish him.”

How can we not think of that prayer to St. Michael the Archangel that Pope Leo XIII more than one hundred years ago asked us to pray for protections against the evil one, a prayer he was purported to have instituted in response to a vision of Satan’s rampage in which the evil one appeared as a “wild boar” ripping up the Lord’s vineyard?

And then Pope Francis has also asked us to avail ourselves of another, very special, spiritual weapon as a defense against the evil one: the intercession of Mary through praying the Rosary:

The Mother of Christ and of the Church is always with us… Mary struggles with us, sustains Christians in their fight against the forces of evil. Prayer with Mary, especially the rosary, has this “suffering dimension,” that is of struggle, a sustaining prayer in the battle against the evil one and his accomplices.

We are in a battle, as individuals and as a Church, but we have not been left orphans. The Lord himself is with us along with the whole heavenly court, and in a special way Mary and St. Michael the Archangel. But we need to do our part and put on the whole armor of God. If we do, we will not only be able to defend ourselves against the “wickedness and snares of the devil,” but we also will wield the “sword of the Spirit which is the Word of God,” and take our part in the New Evangelization.