Temptations and Rationalism

Encountering Spiritual Warfare Up Close

Satan is a rationalist.

Before I get some angry comment thinking I’m attacking rationalists writ large (although some tweets and essays make me think I should) I am making this point as a to write a reflection on the past week that I’ve had in my real life. I will preface it here in case the title wasn’t completely obvious, that this is going to be a personal reflection of a religious nature, specifically within the realms of Orthodox Christianity. Take any theological quips or hang-ups you may have and save them for the comments section. Much to the dismay of some of my followers, I am not this 19th Century Amphibian all the time. Politics isn't something I wish exclusively, although one day I would love to do this as a full time job. Yet I feel the need for a more robust and rounded writer and pundit so today I’d like to share the events of the last week or so and the spiritual battles I had gotten into the trenches of.

I’ve tried writing this out in several ways, and I feel I should put this take away of all things upfront, rather than later down the near the end of this essay. Not exactly the most structured way, I know, but what can I say other than the very fact that it’s all real. Spiritual warfare, the self-discipline required to keep the rules, not just a prayer rule but the mindfulness necessary to maintain the mission that you’re on. I had been warned earlier this year that the attacks from the enemy would only intensify. There was no kidding in that warning, not that I didn’t take it seriously but rather that I wouldn’t know how much it’d affect me physically or mentally. I’ll write more on this later in the essay, but it is all very much real.

So let’s get this little ramble going.

From last Monday to the waning hours of the afternoon this last Sunday, I had been at an Iconography Workshop. Over the course of the last seven months or so, I had the great pleasure to learn from a friend and fellow parishioner the Prosopon School technique of writing Icons in the Orthodox Church. I’m not here to get into the apologetics or the debate over Iconography, although I’d recommend St. Theodore the Studite, St. John Maximovitch, and St. John of Damascus have all written work on this matter in defense of holy tradition.

From the Prosopon School of Iconology Website:

"Prosopon" is a word encountered many times in the Greek Bible. In one of its most common usages, it expresses the aspect of God turned toward the world—his Countenance. In iconology, which is the attentiveness to the Image of God, “Prosopon" can thus be used to indicate the perceivable revelation of God. It can delineate all that which is subject to contemplation within the Divinity of the triune God through the grace of his uncreated Light. The divine Prosopon can be seen as the archetype, revealed in Jesus Christ, to which all iconography aspires.

The first one I wrote over the summer of last year now sits in the family altar of a fellow Parishioner, whose son’s Patron Saint is St. John Cassian. The same Saint and his writings that had first inspired my inquiry into Orthodoxy back in late 2020.

This last week however, was a workshop of happenstance for myself. My friend and instructor, a woman who has survived an intense battle with cancer and is on the mend, wanted to get back into teaching workshops and had a former student seeking her out directly for instruction. Helping her out in preparations, was a board that was that had belonged to our Parish’s first priest, who had reposed some time ago in 2018. A man neither of us had met, but knew of his story through those who knew him. He was a true jack of a trades, from Spiritual Confessor to Electrician to Iconographer. The board being roughly 24 by 20 inches, needed a bit of sanding out- in addition to the fact we had no idea how the board would respond to pigment in comparison to the board her student would be using.

I wasn’t expecting to join in on the class, especially because of the Icon that was to be written. The Icon being The Three Handed Virgin, probably one of the most Orthodox Icons out there, as it depicts the Mother of God, holding the Christ Child in her arms, but there are three hands holding belonging to Our Lady. An Icon made famous by the work of St. John of Damascus, a defender of iconography whose hand was severed off in speaking in defense of holy images. She herself had written it years ago wanting to touch up on her own work, while giving an opportunity to teach her former student more advanced techniques. So I came on board with the class, helping her get the necessary lighting and tablespace to teach at her studio office in her apartment.

Prior to the workshop starting I had quite a bit of nerves going into it, as you don’t start off doing something particular simple (such as a Saint or traditionally the Archangels,) and then go to depicting The Virgin Mary and Christ on the same Icon. Nevertheless, with prayer (and doing the Akathist to the Theotokos) I had tried my best to steady myself, both my hands as well as my mind. This is where I find the Enemy to be a devilishly evil rationalist.

With Lent right around the corner (I’m writing this after Meatfare Sunday) and my catechesis soon coming to a close, have I found myself under a fair amount of stress. Stress probably isn’t the operative word, although it is certainly a byproduct. Any serious conversion to any faith, although in my case, Orthodoxy, will come with struggles. To die with the old man and to change is a very daunting task.

There was a gentleman, who will remain nameless - who wrote that Christianity scares him. Upon seeing his reasons as to why it terrifies him so deeply is the capacity to be fundamentally transformed. Saul of Tarsus, a persecutor of the Church and now one of the most well known disciples of Jesus Christ as Paul the Apostle, whose preserved letters constitute a majority of our New Testament had underwent such a radical transformation that it is indeed a miracle. Most folks aren’t apostles and Saints in the way that St. Paul is venerated, many of us don’t have a theophany that leads us to change. We’re not alone in making that change, but it is certainly a daunting task. There is much of myself that has certainly seen changes in the last several years (not just my own brushes with death) as I’ve made my way back to Christ. There is still much wrong with me, in terms of my own struggles and sins, yet I can see a clear difference in myself from four years ago than I do today.

What makes it a more terrifying experience is that as you set yourself up on this path, to pick up your cross and to follow him, the attacks come in many ways. There are times where I’ve felt a sense of pride in the work that I do, whether that’s practicing reading for services (I read from the Kathisma on Wednesdays during a short Reader’s Vespers) and I am aware of the fact that it could go down a rabbithole that’s not good for me or what I’m being asked to do. Self-awareness and humbling yourself before a much more public humbling tends to go a long way. Not just in the sense of living a spiritual and church life, but also what I do here online as “The Prudentialist” a name I have no problem admitting was out of homage to Dave The Distributist but without the Catholicism of Chesterton. I try to remind myself constantly that I as a man entering his late twenties has somehow gotten in rather well with an online and irl political ecosystem that is very much over my head. A meager following, a meager bit of income, and yet I am keen to remind myself of James 3:1

My brethren, let not many of you become teachers, knowing that we shall receive a stricter judgment.

I have for the longest time been a man who had dreaded saying the phrase “I don’t know”. I was a bit of a know-it-all child, I hope not too annoying, but I was a bookish kid that just happened to know a ridiculous amount of things although probably if I were to look back I’d call my 11 year old self a midwit. However now I certainly appreciate the fact that even with as small of an audience have, the need to get things right or to be more thorough matters. Especially as it seems at the moment that much of the space that I occupy is seemingly focused on the home and hearth. However even now the internal monologue finds itself constantly arguing with and the path that I am on both online and on this spiritual battlefield I find myself in.

One is often warned about being distracted in prayer, the services, or works you do within the Church. As someone whose mind runs at a million miles an hour going in different tangents all at once, that personal stillness and focus is certainly lacking more often that I’d like to admit. This week was no exception, whether it was keeping a steady hand, praying as we floated the pigments down over for the floats and lights, my mind and body felt vulnerable and susceptible to the logic and reasoning of detractors and slanderers of the faith. Of course it can be dismissed with a proverbial and physical headshake, but in an age of madness that St. Anthony the Great had warned of is this not a sign of resisting this madness?

A phrase I had heard often when it came to priests talking about apologetics from youtubers and such is that if you can win souls through argumentation, you can certainly lose them to argumentation as well, emphasizing the need to actually come and see what you’re arguing for or against. This is partially why I find Satan to be a rationalist, or one that can easily spin a yarn of logic to get you to fantastical and far off conclusions that remind of me of Jeff Goldblum in Jurassic Park - “Your scientists were so preoccupied with whether they could, they didn't stop to think if they should.”

From Genesis 3:

⁴ Then the serpent said to the woman, “You will not surely die. ⁵ For God knows that in the day you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”

I guess in writing all of this has been an effort to put my thoughts and feelings to paper more than any kind of edification for your benefit, although I certainly hope some of that can be found here. After all, this is a blogging platform but I know many people from all walks of life find a little bit of knowledge here at Prudent Perceptions. I believe in part for many signs and events in my life have led me down the path that I am on, and surely has been but the Lord helping me along the way to have my own relationship with him. As St. Maximus the Confessor elucidates, God is a God that yearns to be yearned for, and indeed I do especially with this post-transplant new lease on life. Perhaps I will tell my conversion story in full after Pascha, as I am slated for baptism sometime after.

The enemy is real, The Evil One whom we ask from deliverance from both by our own actions by God’s love of mankind. I have only had a taste of that kind of conflict and temptation from the enemy in this spiritual warfare, and to resist the Devil and he will flee from you. Although St. Isiah the Solitary points out;

“If you find yourself hating your fellow men and resist this hatred, and you see that it grows weak and withdraws, do not rejoice in your heart; for this withdrawal is a trick of the evil spirits. They are preparing a second attack worse than the first; they have left their troops behind the city and ordered them to remain there. If you go out to attack them, they will flee before you in weakness. But if your heart is then elated because you have driven them away, and you leave the city, some of them will attack you from the rear while the rest will stand their ground in front of you; and your wretched soul will be caught between them with no means of escape. The city is prayer. Resistance is rebuttal through Christ Jesus. The foundation is incensive power.”

While not the most structured article on this Substack, I certainly hope you can take away something from it. I will leave you with the most recent photo I have on the Icon I am working on, hoping to finish this month with my teacher. I look forward to sharing it in full on the air one of these days, but until then, Godspeed.