This morning, our pastor, Fr. David, posted an inspirational writing on his Facebook page. These are just my own personal thoughts on the issue, not to be confused with truth. My blog is for me to share my struggles and occasional triumphs, a place where I can think out loud. I am always and ever subject to correction.

50. Do not say in your heart, it is now impossible for me to acquire a virginal purity, for I have succumbed in so many ways to the seduction and delirium of the body. For once the soul engages fervently and strenuously in the labours of repentance and we shed tears of compunction, then the prison-house is razed to the ground, the fire of the passions is extinguished, we are spiritually reborn through the abiding presence of the Paraclete, and once again the soul becomes a palace of purity and virginity. God, who is above nature, descends with light and ineffable joy into the soul and sits on the heights of its intellect as upon a throne of glory, bestowing peace on all its inner powers and saying: ‘Peace be with you, peace from hostile passions. I give you My peace, so that you may act according to your true nature. I leave My peace with you, so that you may be perfected into what is beyond nature’ (cf John 14:27). Through His threefold gift of peace He heals the soul’s three powers, brings it into triadic perfection and unites it with Himself. Thus He refashions it and makes it at one stroke wholly virginal, good and beautiful through the fragrance of the myrrh of purity. Then he says to it, ‘Arise. Come near to me, dove of loveliness, through the practice of the virtues; for behold, the storm of the passions has passed. The downpour of sensual pleasure-laden thoughts is over, it has gone its way. The flowers of the virtues, redolent with intellections, have appeared in the soil of your heart ( cf. Song of Songs, 2:10-12). Arise, come near to Me in the knowledge gleaned from the contemplation of the essences of created beings. Come, my dove, on your own wing into the over-canopying darkness of mystical theology, to the faith rooted rock-like in Me, your God.’–Nikitas Stithatos, On the Inner Nature of Things. Philokalia, Vol. IV.

I found it a bit interesting that this same morning that this was posted by our pastor, I was, upon awakening, absolutely assailed by unwanted remembrances of a young lady and what I did with her in the back seat of my father’s car. These were not just passing thoughts. They were strong and insistent demands upon my mind to linger and feast upon mental images of activities which I now deeply regret. It took a bit of time, with the use of the Jesus Prayer, to drive away these thoughts and concentrate on other things than the beauty of the young woman’s body which she so freely shared with me. The very first line of this inspirational piece caught my attention, and I read and then re-read with interest this encouragement to new life in Christ.

After thinking for a while on the message here, I found myself wondering the following: does this man, or anyone like him (i.e. saints of God) actually know what it is like to be an addict? Not just your ordinary garden-variety sinner, but someone who is bound by a certain passion that demands to be fed daily. Addiction is more than just the occasional foray into sin. For the addict, his whole life daily revolves around finding the next opportunity to give way to his addiction. And for the man who has been addicted to sexual activity, either with others or in what the Roman church calls “solitary sin,” every day and almost every minute is a constant seeking to find the next sexual activity. When one is not actually engaged in some form of sexual sin, the mind constantly sins by engaging in thoughts of desire for sin. This is why the pornography industry is such a soul-destroying, demonic horror. For the sexual addict, if he cannot find a willing body, he can simply turn on the computer to feast upon a banquet of naked flesh in order to satiate his disordered passions.

This does not go away. Indeed, after one seriously turns to Christ in repentance, the battle really begins. The devil is not going to give up his prize without a fight, and there is simply no fence or barrier against thoughts. I feel that this fight is unlike the alcoholic. Thoughts about drinking are not sin. Lingering over the thought of a bottle of spirits may be stupid for the alcoholic, since it is a tow-rope into the nearest bar to satisfy those desires, but remembering the feeling of drinking a bottle of Jack Daniels does not in itself constitute sin. The same cannot be said about pornographic thoughts. Once you allow yourself to dwell upon and enjoy them, according to our Lord’s words in Matthew 5: 28, you have already committed a sin.¹ In short, the control of the mind is serious business. The devil knows this all too well, even if we human beings in our stupidity do not, and thereby do not seriously and carefully guard our minds. Sin always begins in the mind, and if not opposed, transfers to the body as an act. Those who willingly engage their wicked thoughts only lack proper place and opportunity for sin to take place. The saints tell us that every sin committed was first birthed in the mind and nurtured by dwelling upon it until it became an action.

Addicts are consumed by passion. The average person may have a sinful thought and pass it off. The addict is consumed. His passion has owned him for a long time, and thus is not easily discarded. The passion begins in the mind and is acted out upon when the opportunity presents itself. For the addict who has turned to Christ in repentance and is seeking health and wholeness, deliverance from that ruling passion, there are only two means of increasing and maintaining that purity. The first is to maintain our baptismal garment of purity by regular participation in the Sacraments of the Confession and the Eucharist.² The second is to fight like hell against the thoughts when they come barging in uninvited, and show them the door. Cry out to the Lord. Invoke His name. Use the Jesus Prayer. Do anything but passively suffer and wait for the thoughts to go away – because they won’t.

This is why St. Mary of Egypt, a promiscuous woman, fled into the desert to do battle with her thoughts. The same desires that drove her to excesses of fornication, “not even for money,” as she put it, became a serious battle when she left the city to seek Christ in solitude. Her desert battle with these thoughts is hard for the modern mind, so given over to the gratification of every lust, to even imagine. ³ I find myself stunned and amazed at St. Mary and the many other saints who excelled in destroying their passions by the use of extreme ascetic feats. They knew the battle, entered into it, and won crowns in their spiritual victory. I, on the other hand, fast for one day and get cranky, constantly looking at the clock to see when I can eat again. Such a hypocrite!

This is why when I read this morning the sentence, “For once the soul engages fervently and strenuously in the labours of repentance and we shed tears of compunction, then the prison-house is razed to the ground, the fire of the passions is extinguished, we are spiritually reborn through the abiding presence of the Paraclete, and once again the soul becomes a palace of purity and virginity.” I honestly didn’t know whether to laugh of just sigh in despair. St Mary of Egypt and the many other saints like her who have engaged in the ascetic struggle are the standard of what it means to really enter into battle with sin. I, on the other hand, have not fasted enough, my prayers and dedication to the Lord have been lukewarm at best, and I have yet to experience tears of compunction, ⁴ I cannot say in all honestly that my soul is at this moment a “palace of purity and virginity.” It more resembles a horse stable filled with the dung of evil thoughts, to which I am constantly trying to take the firehose of prayers of repentance to wash out all the filth. I am not in the place to take up the Cross that St. Mary of Egypt did, nor do I even have, at this time, a spiritual director to help me navigate these troubled waters. In short, this is a lonely and tiring battle, and I have had days when I have really struggled with a serious temptation to just say screw it to the whole Christian life because I am doing it so badly. The only thing that has kept me from just leaving the church and forgetting about it as a wasted, bad effort is this: where am I going to go? Back to the sins that were literally killing me? Back to that which now causes me shame and revulsion when I think of it? No, I am way too far into this changed life to return to that way of life with any gusto or the same disordered desire I had as a young man. By God’s grace, I will plod on. I will fall, get up, fall, get up, and fall again. And by God’s grace, get up again. That is the Christian life and it is warfare. Those who are promoting it as anything else, those Evangelical pastors who preach that your Christian profession means a life of ease, money, and having all the things your sinful little heart lusts after, are doing their people a great disservice. Christianity that is not a battle is not Christianity, even if it wears the name of Christ. It is something else, and the devil is laughing up his sleeve at it.

I know that Fr. David posted this as an encouragement for us, but to me, it is just a mirror that shows how far I am from that which I should be. It is actually kind of a discouragement this morning, since I am constantly failing in this intense warfare, this battle over my soul. It makes me very much afraid of death, since all I can think of is how I have failed to overcome, failed to maintain purity, and every single day I have thoughts which defile my soul. Purity? Meaaaah . . . not me. What shall I answer Christ at the Judgment Seat? My mind is my worst enemy, and my spiritual adversary knows this, and constantly exploits this weakness.

Nonetheless, I need to keep in mind that this will be, at least for me and all the other addicts who share this terrible plight, a fight unto death, and right up to the day of my death. Put on your armor, Christian soldier, fight discouragement, and let the battle continue!

1. Matthew 5: 28 But I say unto you that whosoever looketh upon a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his heart. ↩︎
2. This is the proper order for the Sacraments. First Confession to cleanse the soul before God, then after that, the Eucharist to join yourself to Christ. To receive Christ while in a state of unconfessed sin is asking for problems! ↩︎
3. “Believe me, Abba Zosimas,” the woman said, “I spent seventeen years in this wilderness [after she had spent seventeen years in immorality], fighting wild beasts: mad desires and passions. When I began to eat bread, I thought of the meat and fish which I had in abundance in Egypt. I also missed the wine that I loved so much when I was in the world, while here I did not even have water. I suffered from thirst and hunger. I also had a mad desire for lewd songs. I seemed to hear them, disturbing my heart and my hearing. Weeping and striking myself on the breast, I remembered the vow I had made. At last I beheld a radiant Light shining on me from everywhere. After a violent tempest, a lasting calm ensued.
   “Abba, how shall I tell you of the thoughts that urged me on to fornication? A fire seemed to burn within me, awakening in me the desire for embraces. Then I would throw myself to the ground and water it with my tears. I seemed to see the Most Holy Virgin before me, and She seemed to threaten me for not keeping my vow. I lay face downward day and night upon the ground, and would not get up until that blessed Light encircled me, dispelling the evil thoughts that troubled me. ↩︎
4. I continue to ask the Lord in prayer that He would grant me the “Gift of Tears” from the Holy Spirit. I do so because crying is not something that I do easily (hardly at all actually) nor have I spent serious time weeping over my sins. ↩︎