Refusal.

"The only thing we have to do is to refuse to give in. [to temptation]" -Mother Teresa.

This is a fairly heavy quote. Most times I am faced with the concept of temptation, I think of it in its most basest form, the kind that seems to be most prevalent and blatant in our culture, sexual. The passing of a young, pretty and scantily clad woman, sensual movie scenes, and solitude on the internet, these are times when I find myself tempted to think unwholesome thoughts and to do unwholesome acts. But, because the sin itself is so blatant, so is the escape. Look away, log off, flee... It is not always easy, but the escape is clear. In these situations I find it is easy to act according to this quote my Mother Teresa, but what about temptation that is much deeper and complex? Giving into the enemies lies about loneliness, the perception of others about myself, injustice against pride, suffering? All of the sudden simply refusing to give in does not seem as attainable, it becomes much harder to simply grasp the idea when the "escape" is less visible.

I, of recent, have come to terms with the fact that that I struggle with loneliness, whether I am in actuality alone or not, I have a lingering fear of being alone. There are times when I find myself sitting in despair, wasting away time and energy with thoughts of self pity, anger, and hopelessness. In times like this, I have in fact, succumbed to temptation. I have let the devil convince me that I am not loved, I have let him put weight in the opinions of those who do not matter (in light of God's love), and in turn, I have given the devil grounds to feed my pride, even if in that moment I feel none, because once the despair settles, I can become hardened, angry, and selfish. Giving in to the delusion that I am alone, and therefore my focus should be on my own self defense.

So, in view of such a moment of despair contrasted with this quote with mother teresa, I can try to put my finger on that moment when I failed to "refuse to give in," and I can't. This is because refusal is not always just a black and white "pre-sin" decision we make. In many cases of deeply rooted sin or suffering, refusal is in itself a process that we must seek after, and start enacting and living in our day to day lives, that will eliminate these fleeting moments of servanthood to our pain that build disdain within our souls. Refusal then becomes something we live rather than something you do every now and then.

In my case, I was today, inspired by the writings/teachings of Thomas Merton, a Trappist Monk.

 "If we are to love sincerely and with simplicity we must first of all overcome our fear of not being loved...We must somehow strip ourselves of our greatest illusions about ourselves, frankly recognize how many ways we are unlovable, descend into the depths of our being until we come to the basic reality that is in us, and learn to see that we are lovable after all, in spite of everything!...We must find our real self in all it's elemental poverty, but also in its great and very simple dignity: created to be a child of God, and capable of loving with something of God's own sincerity and his unselfishness."

Thus, this act of humbling myself before God, of attempting to relieve my fear, is my refusal. When I begin to do this, my sincerity in my relationship with the father will grow, and thus my concern with being loved by other men will be replaced by a desire to love the God within them. Merton writes that once we are,

"Centered entirely upon the immense liberality that we experience God's love for us, we will never fear that his love could fail us. Strong in the confidence that we are loved by him, we will not worry too much about the uncertainty of being loved by other men. I do not mean that we will be indifferent to their love for us...but we will never have to be anxious about their love."

I found great peace in this. I have hear it said over and over that we should feel secure in knowing that we have the love of God, so therefore nothing else matters. But that does not mean I know how to discover this love. When I read this I realized that I can truly discover and start to live in the love of God by loving God and loving the God in others with all sincerity, and I can only attain true sincerity through humility. 

"Sincerity must be bought at a price: The humility to recognize our innumerable errors, and fidelity to tirelessly setting them right."

So, if my goal is to love, and I am tirelessly trying to love others and meditate on God's love for me, I do not have the time nor the energy to sit in despair, and the more I love, the more love replaces the loneliness that I was once held captive to. 

Now, I am not yet free, like everything, perfect and pure sincere love takes practice, prayer, takes practice, morality...takes practice and a conscious effort and fidelity. People think that you need to just BE moral, just be good, just be loving... and then when they fail they do not know why, and they begin a cycle of insecurity and self frustration that will lead to frustration with God.

Just like I will never be an expert musician or athlete without practice and patience, so I will never be a skilled and honed man of God who can love sincerely without loads of practice and patience. Practice is not success, if we always succeeded, it would not be practice. Practice is the exercise of failing again and again, but getting better with each attempt. Thus love and morality must be attempted again and again, we must fail, again and again. we must refuse to be angry, refuse to to sin, we must fail at both, but tirelessly keep trying, and in our moments of hopelessness we will find a greater strength that was built out of our little efforts here and there that we implanted by living a life of Refusal.