Part 4, Chapter 3
I hate when it happens. I am doing something and then suddenly there it is. I should say it starts to play, that annoying song, over and over and over again. The more I try to get rid of it, the more it keeps playing. “It is like the song that never ends, it goes on and on my friends, some people started singing it…” It is like that car alarm that keeps going off, once it starts it just keeps going. It is like the Energizer Bunny.
Temptations happen to us all; in living the devout life we should expect it. St. Francis De Sales gives great, great advice that we should heed. “Even so, when Satan, the world, and the flesh look upon a soul espoused to the Son of God, they set temptations and suggestions before that soul, whereby
- Sin is proposed to it.
- Which proposals are either pleasing or displeasing to the soul.
- The soul either consents, or rejects them. In other words, the three downward steps of temptation, pleasure, and consent” (Introduction to the Devout Life, 161).
So in the example of a song that we don’t’ like, we may hear things that are bad and we don’t want to do. The song may just keep playing over and over. The lyrics might be nasty and encouraging us to do horrible things, thus we have a sin proposed. This could go on and on. “But how long soever the temptation may persist, it cannot harm us so long as it is unwelcome to us” (Introduction to the Devout Life, 162). Even if it just keeps playing, there may not be any sin involved. Than the soul makes a choice, it either accepts the sinful action or not.
It is important for us to realize this because sometimes we get stuck with a thought that seems sinful (a temptation), we than believe that we have sinned. That may not be the case, especially if we don’t want to have anything to do with what is happening. It might be totally repulsive to us. And thus we never consent to what is happening. “Thus though our will may have been thoroughly beset by the temptation, it was not conquered, and so we are certain that all such pleasure was involuntary, and consequently not sinful” (Introduction to the Devout Life, 163). So no sin has been committed.
When in the middle of a temptation we should be calling on the Lord for help. We are not alone. “Ask and you shall receive, seek and you shall find, knock and the door shall be opened to you.” Thus, when temptation comes, remember to call upon God and the saints for help. The temptation may persist, but we should continue to turn to the Lord for His strength to endure what is comi