Winning Against Satan

“I must tell you what has hap­pened to me dur­ing the past two nights. I had a very bad time… From about ten o’clock, when I went to bed, until five o’clock in the morn­ing, that wretch did noth­ing but beat me con­tin­u­ally. He pre­sented to my mind many dia­bol­i­cal sug­ges­tions, thoughts of despair , dis­trust in God.”

We may have trou­ble sleep­ing some­times, but these expe­ri­ences that St. Padre Pio had would have done more than keep us awake. We would have been scared to death, for this vil­lain who left him blood­ied, bruised, and swollen was none other than the Devil.

“But praise be to Jesus, for I defended myself by say­ing to him repeat­edly: “your wounds are my merit.” St. Pio knew that the Devil was more afraid than he was , and was frus­trated that this holy priest was sav­ing many souls by prayer and hard work in the Con­fes­sional. Holi­ness scares the Devil.

 

The Real Battle

Satan is a real per­son, who works together with the other dev­ils and demons to try to over­come good with evil. Satan and the other dev­ils rejected God, and eter­nal hap­pi­ness, so their goal is to bring many human beings to share in their mis­ery by also reject­ing God as well and being con­demned to Hell.

It is a real life-​​and-​​death bat­tle, where the eter­nal des­tiny of souls is at stake. Satan is work­ing hard, but he knows he is los­ing. God is more pow­er­ful, and has already won the bat­tle with Christ’s vic­tory over death and sin. Nonethe­less, no one is com­pletely safe on earth, and we must con­tinue to be vig­i­lant in this war.

Where he is more nervous

In spite of the fact that we see some evil peo­ple affected by the Devil, Satan is actu­ally more appar­ent in the lives of many peo­ple who are close to God. He is ter­ri­fied by this close­ness to God and to God’s goodness.

We espe­cially see the Devil at work in the life of Christ. We see how the demons panic at the pres­ence of Christ. We also see the Devil openly try­ing to get Jesus to stum­ble and fall.

In the Gospel Christ teaches us how the Devil works, and uncov­ers his plans. Christ shows us that Satan works through decep­tion and fear; sneak­ing and hid­ing from the truth.

Not so fast…!

One of the Devil’s deceits is that he is more pow­er­ful than God, or God’s equal.

But, the truth is that God is more pow­er­ful. How­ever, unlike Satan, he does not use his power to cause ter­ror, but rather, good. He guides our lives through his lov­ingprov­i­dence and brings us closer to him.

The Father shows us in the life of Christ that even our weak­ness allows God’s strength to be more vis­i­ble. Christ seemed weak and seemed to be under the Devil’s power when he was tor­tured and cru­ci­fied. But this was a plan to defeat Satan and free us from his grip.  

More tricks

The Devil makes us want to feel pow­er­ful, to think we can con­trol the future and the present instead of trust­ing God. He tempted Adam and Eve with the promise of power to know more, if they would go against God. He tries to tempt us to use fortune-​​telling, Ouija boards, and super­sti­tious ways to know the future. He entices us to dis­trust God, and to think that God does not really want our good.

A key virtue in the fight

Humil­ity is a virtue that God loves and the Devil hates, so when we prac­tice this virtue Satan flees. The hum­ble per­son does not try to know every­thing about the future. The real believer does not get mad at God when things go wrong. He trusts God, rec­og­niz­ing that he is our Cre­ator and our Lov­ing Father, and decides to let him be in con­trol of his life.

Key allies

When St. Padre Pio was attacked, he knew how to fight back: “The rosary is my weapon.” It is fas­ci­nat­ing to see that Mary , a sim­ple woman and an unlikely fighter, has such a pow­er­ful role in the fight against evil.

Satan is afraid of our Lady because he was never able to get near her. He was never able to make her sin. Her absolute trust in God showed in an uncon­di­tional “yes” to God’s will and his love, while the Devil said a self­ish “no”. She crushed Satan with­out mean­ing to. Draw­ing close to Mary is a sure way to fight the Devil.

Other pow­er­ful allies in our fight against the Devil are the saints and angels. St. Michael the Archangel is a pro­tec­tor of Chris­tians in a spe­cial way. Each saint helps us in our bat­tle too, using the full spir­i­tual weapons of heaven.

Sur­pris­ing power

Real exor­cists also remind us that Satan is expelled by the sacra­ments of Bap­tism andCon­fes­sion. Fr. Gabriel Amorth, an expe­ri­enced exor­cist in Rome, tells that what the Devil fears most is a good Con­fes­sion. Christ made us able to beat sin and Satan through this sacra­ment. A good Con­fes­sion really makes us saints.

Sur­pris­ing peace

Have you ever noticed how much you feel peace in Mass or after a good Con­fes­sion? Con­fes­sion and the Eucharist are a source of peace. Christ is truly present there and reminds us that he is more pow­er­ful than sin and death. Feed­ing our life of gracethrough fre­quent recep­tion of the Eucharist and Con­fes­sion not only strength­ens our spir­i­tual lives, but it lessens the Devil’s power over us. Satan is afraid of any Catholic liv­ing the life of grace.

Our call

Preach­ing Christ is also a pow­er­ful way we over­come the Devil. The saints show us this.

We have a big role in preach­ing today. Often we have friends who play with dan­ger­ous things. If we char­i­ta­bly but firmly remind them that Christ is the true power and the peace that they are look­ing for, we can help them see the Devil’s tricks.

Point­ing these friends to the sacra­ments and to prayer will give them the tools they need to find real peace and true strength . This often requires real moral courag e on our part, but we can offer them the best gift a friend can give: the peace of God’s strong, faith­ful love. We can remind them that any­one who fears the Devil, who has dab­bled in super­sti­tious things, only needs to come close to the sacra­ments to be strength­ened again.

Draw­ing good out of evil

A recent movie, The Exor­cism of Emily Rose, showed the story of a young girl who was actu­ally pos­sessed by the Devil. Pos­ses­sions are not always due to accept­ing Satan, even though this can hap­pen too. But some­times this is not the person’s fault at all.

We do not have to be com­pletely sur­prised at this, because it hap­pens in the phys­i­cal world as well. Look at a car acci­dent. Remem­ber the last time you got sick. It is not always the fault of the per­son. It is not a spe­cial punishment.

Like many saints who had to bat­tle with the Devil, and like many sad things that hap­pen, some­times God allows this in order to bring about a greater good. In the case of dra­matic man­i­fes­ta­tions of the Devil, these cases often help peo­ple to believe in God more, to trust his power, and to care more for others.

Those who have car­ried the unusual cross of hav­ing the Devil own their body for a time (even though he can never own their soul if they do not let him) have gained tremen­dous graces for the Church by their effort and fidelity.

Those who have allowed some level of evil in their lives through sin, but come back to Christ, gain tremen­dous merit before God, and gain graces for the Church.  

The Exor­cist

Every priest is a pow­er­ful exor­cist through the Sacra­ment of Con­fes­sion and through preach­ing. He dri­ves away many demons when peo­ple come to be rec­on­ciled with God or stirs con­ver­sion in their hearts. In spe­cial cases, how­ever, the Bishop can des­ig­nate a priest for the spe­cial role of an exorcist.

These priests have enor­mous con­fi­dence in God, know­ing that the Devil is ter­ri­bly afraid of Christ and the priest who is united to Christ.

Hal­loween

Hal­loween means “the eve (evening) before All Hal­lows Day (All Saints Day).” Dur­ing Hal­loween sea­son, many peo­ple for­get that the real cel­e­bra­tion is Novem­ber 1 st , All Saint’s Day. It is a cel­e­bra­tion of the vic­tory of all the saints, and the hope of our tri­umph as well.

The ear­li­est Chris­tians used to ven­er­ate those in their com­mu­nity who met the test of mar­tyr­dom and were suc­cess­ful in bear­ing wit­ness to Christ till the end. They assigned spe­cial days to note the spir­i­tual vic­tory of each one who remained faith­ful under fear of death, but as the num­ber of mar­tyrs and saints grew, there were not enough days in the year to give each a feast day. Thus, one day was cho­sen to honor all the saints, both those known and those who were unnamed or unrecognized.

A cel­e­bra­tion of holiness

For Chris­tians, Novem­ber can be a spe­cial time to renew our quest for holi­ness . We remem­ber all the saints, and we remem­ber all souls in gen­eral, espe­cially those who have died but are wait­ing to arrive to Heaven.

The bat­tle of their lives is over, but ours is still being waged, and the out­come has yet to be decided. We have the pos­si­bil­ity of being holy, or of giv­ing in to the tac­tics and temp­ta­tions of the Devil. Christ tells us to not be afraid, because when we love him he dri­ves out all fear, and dri­ves the Devil away.

Bible Blurbs

“All were struck with aston­ish­ment, and they began say­ing to one another: “What is there about his speech? He com­mands the unclean spir­its with author­ity and power, and they leave.” (Luke 4: 36)

“Then war broke out in Heaven; Michael and his angels bat­tled against the dragon. Although the dragon and his angels fought back, they were over­pow­ered and lost their place in Heaven. “ (Rev­e­la­tion 12: 7-​​8)

“Our bat­tle is not against human forces but against the prin­ci­pal­i­ties and pow­ers, the rulers of this world of dark­ness, the evil spir­its in regions above.” (Eph­esians 6:12)

“The rea­son the Son of Man appeared was to destroy the works of the Devil.” (1 John 3:

Cat­e­chism Clips

• 395 “The power of Satan is not infi­nite. He is only a crea­ture, pow­er­ful from the fact that he is pure spirit, but still a crea­ture. He can­not pre­vent the build­ing up of God’s kingdom.”
• 2115 “…a sound Chris­t­ian atti­tude con­sists in putting one­self confi dently into the hands of Prov­i­dence for what­ever con­cerns the
• future, and giv­ing up all unhealthy curios­ity about it.”
• 1673 “…Jesus per­formed exor­cisms and from him the Church has received the power and offi ce of exor­ciz­ing. In a sim­ple form,
• exor­cism is per­formed at the cel­e­bra­tion of Baptism.
• 1673 … The solemn exor­cism, called “a major exor­cism,” can be per­formed only by a priest and with the per­mis­sion of the bishop.
• 1673 “…There­fore, before an exor­cism is per­formed, it is impor­tant to ascer­tain that one is deal­ing with the pres­ence of the Evil
• One, and not an illness.
• 1708 “By his Pas­sion, Christ deliv­ered us from Satan and from sin.
• 2116 All forms of div­ina­tion are to be rejected… They con­tra­dict the honor, respect, and lov­ing fear that we owe to God alone.
• 2024 Sanc­ti­fy­ing grace makes us “pleas­ing to God.

Pope Quotes

“Satan sug­gests a tri­umphal mes­sian­ism to Jesus, con­sist­ing in won­ders… But Jesus’ choice, in total obe­di­ence to the Father’s will, is clear and unequiv­o­cal. (Pope John Paul II, Gen­eral Audi­ence, June 3, 1998)

“Jesus’ strug­gle with Satan, which began in the wilder­ness, con­tin­ues through­out his life. One of his typ­i­cal activ­i­ties is pre­cisely that of exor­cist.” (Pope John Paul II, Gen­eral Audi­ence, June 3, 1998)

‘”May prayer strengthen us for the spir­i­tual bat­tle we are told about in the Let­ter to the Eph­esians: ‘Draw strength from the Lord and from His mighty power’ (Eph­esians 6:10). The Book of Rev­e­la­tion refers to this same bat­tle, recall­ing before our eyes the image of St. Michael the Archangel (Rev­e­la­tion 12:7). Pope Leo XIII cer­tainly had a very vivid rec­ol­lec­tion of this scene when, at the end of the last cen­tury, he intro­duced a spe­cial prayer to St. Michael through­out the Church. Although this prayer is no longer recited at the end of Mass, I ask every­one not to for­get it and to recite it to obtain help in the bat­tle against forces of dark­ness and against the spirit of this world.”’(Pope John Paul II, April 24th 1994 )

Saint Michael the Archangel, defend us in battle. Be our pro­tec­tion against the wicked­ness and snares of the devil. May God rebuke him, we humbly pray; and do Thou, O Prince of the Heav­enly Host by the Divine Power of God - cast into hell, satan and all the evil spirits, who roam through­out the world seek­ing the ruin of souls.
Amen.

SAINTS AND HEROES

 Sur­pris­ing Trial

BLESSED MOTHER THERESA OF CALCUTTA:
1910-​​1997. Mother Theresa worked among the poor­est of the poor and was already con­sid­ered a saint dur­ing her life­time. Yet God allowed her to have severe spir­i­tual tri­als dur­ing the last 50 years of her life. This may have been so that mod­ern Chris­tians under­stand that holi­ness does not always mean feel­ing holy. God asked her to expe­ri­ence con­stant temp­ta­tions of lack of faith in Him and temp­ta­tions of despair, yet her will remained fi rmly rooted in God. Apparently towards the end of her life the devil even tried to get access to her body dur­ing a time when she was very sick in the hos­pi­tal one year before she died. Her bishop and spir­i­tual direc­tor, also sick in the same hos­pi­tal, ordered a priest to give her pro­tec­tion by per­form­ing a sim­ple exor­cism on her. The nuns who attended her reported that she was very happy about this and joined in the prayers. Calm returned to her body the same day.

Pow­er­ful Priest

ST. JOHN VIANNEY, Cure D’Ars:

1786-​​1859. St. John Bap­tist Vian­ney was born in the mid­dle of the French Rev­o­lu­tion, in 1786. He had to receive his First Com­mu­nion secretly at age 13, because the Church was being per­se­cuted. He was a sim­ple shep­herd who had lit­tle education, so when he felt called to the sem­i­nary he had trou­ble with the Latin and other sub­jects. However, he gained a rep­u­ta­tion for his devout­ness and holi­ness. As a priest, he watched over his fl ock, and was unafraid to speak the truth. Peo­ple began to come from every­where to hear him and have Con­fes­sion with him, so much that he would spend 16 hours every day in the con­fes­sional. He often expe­ri­ence dia­bol­i­cal attacks, and taught the peo­ple how to resist temp­ta­tions of the devil. He ded­i­cated him­self to the sal­va­tion of sin­ners until his death in 1869.

Vocab­u­lary

DESPAIR: Los­ing hope. Com­pletely giv­ing up. Not trust­ing in God’s good­ness and help.

DESTINY: The result of one’s life. Final outcome.

VIGILANCE: Stay­ing watch­ful or alert to dan­ger or trouble.

PROVIDENCE: Guidance.God’s lov­ing care for our lives and for our future.

HUMILITY: Rec­og­niz­ing that all the good in us comes from God. Con­sid­er­ing your­self unim­por­tant. Will­ing­ness to do God’s will.

SIMPLE: Not com­pli­cated, innocent.

UNCONDITIONAL: With­out reserve, unlimited.

LIFE OF GRACE: Hav­ing Christ as Lord of our hearts. Love for him. Being free from any mor­tal sin.

SACRAMENTS: Sacred action that bring us sanc­ti­fy­ing grace.

PRAYER: Dia­logue with God. Lis­ten­ing atten­tively to God.

MORAL COURAGE: Brav­ery in liv­ing and defend­ing the truth

MERIT: Some­thing that deserves a reward, praise, or gratitude

CONFIDENCE: Firm belief, trust, certainty.

HOLINESS: Being like Christ. Liv­ing like Christ. Being authen­ti­cally close to God.

EXORCISM: When the Church asks pub­licly and author­i­ta­tively in the name of Jesus Christ that a per­son or object be pro­tected against the power of the Evil One and with­drawn from his dominion.

DIVINATION: The act of try­ing to fore­tell the future or explore the unknown by occult means.

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS:

1. What are some ways that the Devil influ­ences soci­ety, and tries to keep peo­ple away from God?

3. What are some ways that you can fight the Devil?

4. What are some ways that you can help your fam­ily or friends fi ght evil and be on God’s side?