Spiritual Warfare

Each of us is engaged in spiritual warfare!
It's not only the inner battle that we face every day to resist temptation and not to sin. It is also the struggle against the world and its ways, that are directed away from or against God. We are not alone in this battle. We have on our side our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ, His Blessed Mother and St Joseph, our holy guardian angel, and all the saints of Heaven. We are part of a powerful spiritual force. We are on the winning side!

If you would like to contact me to provide feedback, suggestions  or to ask questions you can do this via email:

frpchandler@armidale.catholic.org.au

Also if you would like to support me in this work, please send me an email and I will provide details for how you can make a donation. 

Music by TheNonVisibles from Pixabay

Transcript

Copy Transcript Copied

SPEAKER_00 0:22

Let's be honest. Living the Catholic faith is hard, and it seems to be getting harder as our society moves further away from faith, away from God. It brings to mind the classic description of the Christian life as spiritual warfare. I say classic because there has always been the inner spiritual struggle against temptation and sin, but also there has been a struggle when our forebears in the faith also lived in a society that was antagonistic and rebellious. So the concept of spiritual warfare is not unique to our time, though it now has its own qualities. I was reading an article online during the week from a Catholic webpage called The Catholic Thing. The author of the article, Robert Royal, recalled after a trip he had taken to Cape Canaveral in Florida, the speech given by President John F. Kennedy in 1962, committing the USA to put a man on the moon by the end of that decade. In his speech the President asked, Why the Moon? He went on to say because it was hard to do, and that goal will serve to organise and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win. It's a matter of historical record that the people of the United States accepted their leader's challenge to do something that was hard, and in june nineteen sixty nine Neil Armstrong walked on the moon. The author of the article went on to say, and I quote You cannot look at all this history and help but wonder if we are capable, or once at least were capable, of doing such hard things in a secular pursuit? Why do we not undertake the even harder and nobler task of getting ourselves to what Saint Augustine called the heaven of heavens? He goes on to ask why are there voices in the church, let alone the world, that rename the hard things of Catholic life as ideals that most are not expected to achieve? There is always a grave danger in diluting Christ's teaching. Our faith tells us that the goal of human life is salvation, seeing God face to face, and that reality is not altered by a government or a culture's refusal to accept it. So do we follow the harder path of righteousness or the seemingly easier path of wickedness. The Prophet Jeremiah in today's first reading for Holy Mass is not invoking or wishing upon a person a blessing or a curse. Instead the Prophet is saying that people who behave in the two ways that he describes are blessed or cursed. There is no need to wish it on them, for their own behaviour merits it and brings it on themselves. Likewise in the gospel reading there are blessings, which is more accurate translation than happiness, that our Lord says come from being without the things that the world values, like riches, fame, or festivity. It's not because Christ wishes to stifle joy, but rather that he turns the world upside down, because the world has priorities that are twisted and distorted. Some who listen to Jesus, and more than likely some who heard Jeremiah, would have said, Why does it have to be so hard? At times I think that niggling question arises in our own consciousness as well. Denzel Washington, a Hollywood actor, as you know, wrote recently in a New York Times article about our current situation in the world. This is a spiritual warfare. I'm not looking at it from an earthly perspective. If you don't have a spiritual anchor, you'll be easily blown by the wind. So brothers and sisters, we are presented today by incontrovertible evidence that there is a spiritual battle in our Catholic life. Jesus Christ, who is truth itself, tells us so, as does Jeremiah, but also some insightful and reflective people. Will you engage in this battle? Or will you sit back and let it rage around you? To pick up your God given weapons, holy mass and holy communion, and frequent confession, which are guarantees of divine grace for those who are properly disposed, and of course your rosary beads will commit you to the battle, but will also, as our Lord promises, bring happiness and also sure blessings. And do not forget as well, the wonderful prayer to Saint Michael the Archangel that asks him and all the angelic powers to protect us in this battle. La Dato Jesus Christus. Saint Michael the Archangel, pray for us. Our holy guardian angels, pray for us.