Overcoming sin- and the natural which has been twisted into evil by evil!

(Journey in a Broken World; Chastity South Africa; South African Catholic)

Article by Marc Aupiais

Often- when evil tries to overcome me- I have a method which works- I try to see what desire has been twisted by evil against me. Pure evil doesn't exist- it only has power in twisting good.

Now- when it is pride- we realize the true emotion twisted is love of God, and care of self, and self esteem in proportion- realizing this- we endorse the true desires- and when evil is weak enough, or rather- when the good still is fighting- then this rids us of the evil, which somehow withers and dies.

We need firstly to change the evil desire into the good one- to straighten the broken tree's stem, to fix a broken spinal cord, through forcing the broken back into the place it is meant to exist!

Now, sometimes this does not work- and so we sit- trying to wait out the evil of sin- and fight strong desires, as though we were fighting a disease. Unfortunately, of human force alone, such force not always works- we tire quickly and are met again when weaker- which is why often sacraments are such power- and the realization that we can wait it out... in this, however we tire- and often start asking God in prayer- why we cannot have the evil wish we desire, even ask for lifting of the moral obligation- for some excuse to be doing good. Evil has no substance, except in that which is good.

In this- we feel almost electric power, and irritation enter us- as we either give into it, and find we are weaker the next skirmish, or else- try our hardest, and find we have already fallen- or manage to get through it, desperately praying- knowing it will come back again, having weakened us sufficiently.

At this point- we realize that the true desire- ours for whatever it is has ceased to be, or if it hasn't- we perhaps have tried very hard to feed the true desire which has been twisted, and justly we have tried to fight the other- and as yet have not succeeded. Now- if we resist, we are given the grace to do so- but surely- how do we win..?

The desire below is natural- it is ours, is it not- but this other desire- where does it come from, is it not the mutation of the desire we truly have, or had- is it not alien, foreign..?

We are fighting a desire, which is not natural, for sin is insanity, and is not ours- it is alien- so why should we at all be obligated to follow something that is neither sane, nor ours. We calmly must determine not to follow it- to say no to it- and to lower ourselves in our souls. We then begin to pray about this foreign desire within- to saints such as Philomena- and give our bodies over to them to cure, all the while determined to attend the next possible confession.

We realize the desire is not ours- and so we ignore it- like an aggressive tyrant without any power. It is not ours, it is not of our self... it is foreign, and we reject it utterly.

In this- we acknowledge not only the foreignness of this desire- but also the natural desire below, which has been mutated, and we determine to live in better balance with this and to admit it as truth, as truth will set you free. Of course- if our world-view is wrong, if we believe that those things forbidden by Mother Church are natural- then we might as well not even attempt to fight- we must win through submittal to morality and to truth- as the natural means.

Only evil tries to justify that actings of man which are not natural, nor sane.

Good attempts to cure them, or to manage them so as to stop evil triumphing.
That which is moral- is the boundary and fullness of that which is natural.