Journey Back to Eden.pdf - St Mark Coptic Orthodox Church Chicago

A TIME OF SIGNS: CAELUM ET TERRA 61is the struggle now; it is really about whether or not we can endureand persevere and grow in our vocation.Abuna Sidrak said that we are supposed to do battle with theEvil One by our humility before God. We must be alert to recognizetemptations as early as possible and to nip them in the bud. Bydoing so, we can prevent the attractions from overpowering us for,he noted, they can quickly grow in us. They send out their rootsrapidly, and soon we find that they preoccupy the majority of ourthoughts in one form or another.When the Christian monk prays the psalm verse “Happy theman who shall smash your little ones on the rock” (Psalm 137:9), he hasthis very complex situation of evil and temptation in mind. Babylon’spower to enslave, and the devil’s power to tempt, might firstsuggest themselves with little faults, but they will one day grow bigenough to rule over us.Abuna Sidrak said the Evil One improves on our desires; hemakes things seemingly more sweet. But things are not more sweet.Life simply becomes more base. Our senses are lowered in terms oftheir capacity for true enjoyment. While we appear to be enjoyingmore and more, we are actually experiencing less and less pleasure.It is Jesus, he said, who came to give us life to the fullest; he raisedour capacity for joy to the highest level possible.In any place where we are, there will be fleshly desires, AbunaSidrak added, desires that are interior and private. This gives theEvil One an occasion to tempt or to test us. But these occasions oftemptation are by no means sins; they are, in fact, opportunities togrow in holiness. They are occasions to rise in nobility. But if weshould fail, it is because we have lived internally in desperation andin fear.The devil has convinced us that unless we grasp for what willsatisfy us, it will not be given to us by God; that God is not so generous,apparently, as he claims to be. So we fear, in our own desperation,that we must place our priorities ahead of God’s, andmake our own anxieties and our own neediness greater than ourtrust in his solicitude or his Providence.Abuna Sidrak said that the tongue is frequently the specialfoothold of temptation, either in terms of gluttony or in terms ofmalicious or deceptive speech. So the taming of the tongue—especiallyas St. James speaks about it in his letter (James 3:1-13)—isthe primary ascetical work of the monk, and of every Christian. It