I saw a sweatshirt that said, “I Stopped Fighting My Inner Demons because I realized we’re On the Same Side.”
Although most deviant behavior may be explained by natural causes, psychotics, for example, suffer from a loss of object reality while demons are separate spiritual beings. Psychology can explain when someone hears voices that only exist only within a person's mind and she thinks they are real; we label that behavior hallucinatory. In contrast, our Gospel narrative today shows that the bad spirits had an ego identification— they knew themselves and they knew who Christ was. There was a literal two-way conversation and relationship in process.1
Christ has power to heal regardless what our need may be, including power over any demon, whether that demon be an addiction, a heartache, a sin--whatever our need may be--Christ can set us free.
The early monks knew this and wrote a lot about the tactics that demons use to tempt us:
The first method is social, the demons attempt to preserve the monks' social natural by trying to engage the monks' memories of relatives who are either grieving or dying, or are held captive [in a debtors prison] and it’s all the monk’s fault. The reality is that the monastic life cannot be lived without a withdrawal from family and friends.2
In our Gospel today, the demons cry out, "What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth. Have you come to destroy us?”
The demon uses the object pronoun “us,” which is non-binary, to refer to the many demons possessing the person. Notice that Jesus responds in the singular, "Quiet! Come out of him! Literally, “be muzzled.” You would think that Jesus would appreciate the free advertising.
The early Christian monks knew that as far as surrendering our relatives or children go, this includes surrendering our children’s entitled life. It means trusting God not only with their safety, their decisions, and their future but also with the kind of life I think they should have. At some point, we all have to surrender to God not only our children, but the life we want for our children. 3
Regarding the temptation towards unnecessary anxiety. The 3-3-3 rule is an easy technique to remember and use in the moment if something is triggering your anxiety.
It involves looking around your environment to identify three objects and three sounds, then moving three body parts, like move your hand, lift up a leg, etc. Many people find this strategy helps focus and ground them when anxiety overwhelms them.
In the second method of warfare the demons tempt the monks' physical body with restlessness and agitation, drowsiness, or thoughts of leaving the monastery to get married and for romance. The goal is thwart their vocation and prayer life by disturbing their concentration which happens to be the very means of achieving mastery over the demons. Prayer with the heart involves concentration and a well-known saying of the monks is that demons fear concentration as thieves fear dogs."
“The demon is very envious of us when we pray, and uses every kind of trick to thwart our purpose. Therefore he is always using our memory to stir up thoughts of various things and our flesh to arouse the passions, in order to obstruct our way of ascent to God. Angels are at the service of the lower. This will defeat the demon’s tactics.
In our Gospel, the demons ask Jesus, “Have you come to destroy us?” Yes, Jesus came to destroy the power of the devil. And the time appointed is in the Book of Revelation chapter 20; the devil and the demons will be cast into the lake of fire and brimstone thus ending all demonic control and influence over human beings.
The third tactic of the demon is the most dangerous and it’s called the darts of the enemy, which the novena prayer of Divine Mercy of Saint Faustina mentions. Specifically, the demons try to "darken the mind" of the monk "and then they will suggest whatever they like.
For example, an impossible goal, or to practice a new ministry or project that will distract them from their immediate pursuit, or the image of a person to trigger and distract them. This dart is sudden and the monks called this a mental trick of the demon, using the phrase the "flick of the mind" (pararrhipismon noos). There is nothing swifter or more indiscernible among spirits. It manifests itself in the soul by a simple remembrance, which is instantaneous, independent, inapprehensible, and, in some cases, even unknown to the person himself.
By manipulating the monk's mind, the demons disable the monk's ability both to understand and to resist the demonic warfare.
The solution is 2 Cor. 10:5: bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ.
The message for us that the hidden places of the heart must be very carefully purified. A well-known helpful phrase is, “The prince of disobedience is the Devil and you beat him by being obedient.”
There are demons in our lives that control us as harmfully as demons tormented people in our Lord ’s Day. The demons that run rampant in our lives are things such as pride, guilt, envy, an unforgiving spirit, a sin. Sometimes these things control us so completely that we are powerless against them
e.g. John Barleycorn" is an English and Scottish folk song. John Barleycorn, the song's protagonist, is a personification of barley and of the alcoholic beverages made from it: beer and whisky. John Barleycorn is a sneaky, double-crossing guy who only rewards in despair, insanity and alcoholic death.
In our Gospel, Jesus rebuked the demons. The Hebrew verb is ga’ar, to “shout at, exorcise, rebuke.” You don’t have to “shout” at the devil, literally, but that is included in the pronouncement of a commanding word whereby God or his spokesman brings evil powers into submission.
Method four is pride, that the monk has made great progress so they can rest on their laurels. The demons achieve this by withdrawing from the monk, bringing a temporary end to the warfare, which in turn creates the image that the monk has already arrived at perfection, or the angelic life, or the communion of angels and martyrs. In other words, the demons become an angel of light so that the monk remains vulnerable to a future attack.
Authority is internal, in the Greek in means, “out of one’s essence.”
Jesus tells us in Luke 10:19, “I have given you authority to trample on snakes and scorpions and to overcome all the power of the enemy; nothing will harm you.”
The term for authority has the primary reference to one’s right to exercise that right. It’s virtually automatically effective. It works ex opere operato. In the Book of Acts, we see the early church having effective faith "in the name of Jesus" for exorcism and other healing as well, of course, for salvation. Just using Jesus’s name does not depend on any traditional technique or any special formula, or formulas, like witches have to depend on.
Note well that our Gospel begins with “and on the Sabbath Jesus entered the synagogue and taught.”
Be confident in your right to exercise your authority to rebuke temptation and not give in all the more so if you are worshipping regularly.
1. Millard J. Sall, Demon possession or psychopathology: a clinical differentiation, Journal of Psychology & Theology, 4 no 4 Fall 1976, p 286-290
2. All spiritual warfare quotes from Evagrius of Pontus
3. LISA APPELO. Surrendering Our Children To God Means Surrendering Their Entitled Life, blog.
