Part 4, Chapter 5
Engaging in a staring contest can be a real trial. I remember doing this as a kid, the whole point of it was to have the person you were staring at move their eyes. Sometimes though, we would naturally blink and the person we were staring at would think they had won. Blinking is natural and so it cannot be considered a win in a staring contest because it was involuntary. The way to win a staring contest was to cause voluntary movement that would disengage eye contact with the other person who was staring, without touching them to do so.
At times, temptations can be like a staring contest. Temptations can be thrown at us, trying to get us to take our eyes away and we might even blink, but that does not mean that we have given into the temptations. “Come what may in the shape of temptation, attended by whatsoever of pleasure—so long as your will refuses consent, not merely to the temptation itself, but also to the pleasure, you need have no fear, God is not offended” (Introduction to the Devout Life, 165). We don’t willingly blink and so we have not given into the temptation.
Now with this example of the staring contest we have to think that we are staring at God, and that temptation is trying to get us to take our eyes off of Him. Blinking is not a voluntary taking our eyes off of God, rather it is involuntary. “For so long as the power to refuse exists within the soul, we may be sure that love, the life of the soul, is there and that Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior, is within, although, it may be, hidden; and that by means of steadfast perseverance in prayer, and the Sacraments, and confidence in God, strength will be restored, and the soul will live with a full and joyous life” (Introduction to the Devout Life, 165-166). To keep one’s eyes on God, we need prayer and the Sacraments. These are the glue that keep us stuck staring at the Lord.