Who Am I?

Four Hundred Texts on Love (Third Century) 46

Posted: June 7th, 2012 | Author: | Filed under: St. Maximos the Confessor | Tags: , , , , , | Comments Off on Four Hundred Texts on Love (Third Century) 46

93.  The angelic powers urge us towards what is holy. Our natural instincts and our probity of intention assist us. But the passions and sinfulness of intention reinforce the provocations of the demons.

It’s a struggle that’s in the air we breathe. We can no more escape this constant push and pull than we can escape ourselves. People didn’t turn to the desert as monastics to escape this struggle. They went to face it full on without the masks usually pulled over it. I think that we tend to misunderstand that aspect of the monastic call. It’s not about escape or hiding. It’s more about turning all of one’s resources toward this struggle on your own behalf and on the behalf of the world. At least that’s how it seems to me, even as I note that I’m thoroughly nothing like a monastic in any sense.


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