by James Martin
In the 1940 Alfred Hitchcock movie Rebecca, based on a Daphne Du Maurier novel, there is a marvelous scene in which Mrs. Danvers, the wicked servant of the house (played by Judith Anderson), is peering out a window alongside Mrs. de Winter, the new wife of the master of the house. The jealous servant despises the new wife and has succeeded in making her life in the house miserable. Lonely and forlorn, the new Mrs. de Winter gazes at the ground below her, as Mrs. Danvers encourages her to kill herself.
“You have nothing to live for, really, have you?” she purrs. “Look down there. It’s easy, isn’t it? Why don’t you? Why don’t you? Go on . . . go on . . . don’t be afraid.”
That’s the way the evil spirit works: encouraging us to continue our bad thoughts or bad actions, moving us backward. “Go on,” it says. “It’s easy, isn’t it?”
For persons on the downward path, the good spirit acts in the opposite way. Here you feel the sting of conscience “with remorse,” says Ignatius. If you’re stealing money from your company, you will feel a jolt in your conscience, saying, in essence, “Wake up! You’re doing something wrong!” That’s the good spirit at work.
Here Ignatius famously uses a homey metaphor: the drop of water. For those going from bad to worse, the evil spirit feels like a drop of water falling on a sponge: soothing, calming, encouraging. Or as Ignatius says, “delicate, gentle, delightful.” But the good spirit in these cases is like the drop of water falling on a stone: startling, hard, even loud. “Violent, noisy, and disturbing,” says Ignatius. As my friend David would say, “Pay attention!”
By the way, when we are going from bad to worse, the startling drop of water on a stone can come both interiorly and exteriorly: it can take the form of hardnosed advice from a friend, who jolts us out of spiritual complacency.
For those moving in the opposite direction—which is most of us—trying to lead a good life, striving to go from good to better, the feelings are reversed. In this case the good spirit is like the drop of water on the sponge; the bad spirit the drop of water on the stone.
Let’s say you’ve decided to volunteer at a soup kitchen. In this case, the good spirit gently encourages you on this good path. Here, says Ignatius, the good spirit will “stir up courage and strength, consolations, tears, inspirations, and tranquility. [The good spirit] makes things easier and eliminates all obstacles, so that the persons may move forward in doing good.” You will feel consoled, inspired, and buoyed up as you think of volunteering and moving along a loving path.
The enemy will move you in the other direction, acting like the drop of water on the stone. Uh oh! you think suddenly, I’ve never done anything like this! It’s too hard! Frequently this comes as a sudden, disorienting fear. It is characteristic of the evil spirit, says Ignatius, to “cause gnawing anxiety, to sadden, and to set up obstacles. In this way he unsettles these persons by false reasons aimed at preventing their progress.”
Why do good and evil spirits work in opposite ways depending on the state of one’s soul? Here’s Ignatius’s homey explanation: “The reason for this is the fact that the disposition of the soul is either similar to or different from the respective spirits who are entering. When the soul is different, they enter with perceptible noise and are quickly noticed. When the soul is similar, they enter silently, like those who go into their own house by an open door.”
Another discernment dyad I like to use is what-ifs and if-onlys. For the person trying to do good, the evil spirit discourages you with what-ifs and if-onlys. Let’s say that you’ve started to volunteer at a local shelter. Suddenly you have a frightening thought: Oh no! What if I get sick working with all of those poor people? What if one of them attacks me? What if the staff thinks I’m too inexperienced? Those what-ifs lead to a dead end. The enemy proposes only the worst about the future, which is unknowable. That’s the evil spirit causing “gnawing anxiety,” and it should be avoided.
If-onlys focus our worries on the past. You might be derailed by thinking, If only I had started this years ago! If only I hadn’t wasted so much time! If only I had thought about the poor earlier! The evil spirit is causing “gnawing anxiety,” this time centered on the past. That’s a dead end as well: the past cannot be changed. Ignore that feeling, too.
Sometimes what-ifs and if-onlys can help us dream, or they can move us to sorrow for our sins. But when they move you toward fear, prevent you from moving ahead in healthy ways, lead to dead ends, and “cause gnawing anxiety,” they are most likely not coming from God.
Finally, you might look carefully at the “pushes” and “pulls,” too. One of my spiritual directors, Damian, said that when you feel pushed to do something—I should do this, I should do that—out of a sense of crushing and lifeless obligation or a desire to please everyone, it may not be coming from God. David Donovan used to call this “shoulding all over yourself.” (Read it aloud and the pun becomes obvious.)
God’s “pulls,” on the other hand—gentle invitations that beckon in love—feel different. Sometimes an obligation is an obligation, and you need to do it in order to be a good and moral person. But be careful your life is not simply one in which you only respond to shoulds or pushes that may not be coming from God.
No Changes in Desolation
Another tip: “During a time of desolation one should never make a change,” says Ignatius. Why not? Because when you are feeling distant from God and experiencing desolation (gnawing anxiety, etc.), you are more inclined to be guided by the evil spirit. When feeling abandoned by God, you are more likely to say, “This is useless!” and change course. Or ask despairingly, “What’s the use?” and give up. Don’t do it. To allow yourself to be led by desolation, says Michael Ivens, is to be drawn into “downward momentum.”
This makes sense, doesn’t it? If someone told you that he was miserable, couldn’t think straight, and was completely despairing, would you say that this is a good time for him to make a big decision? Of course not. He’s not thinking clearly. “Don’t make decisions when you’re freaking out,” is another way of saying it. You’re more likely to be guided by unhealthy motives. Yet people do that all the time—out of desperation. Resist that urge.
What’s more, says Ignatius, when you are in desolation you should do the following: pray and meditate even more; embark on further self-examination; remind yourself that you’re not all-powerful; and try to be patient. Likewise, when you find yourself in a state of consolation, you might “store up new strength” for the future, like a smart squirrel storing up nuts for the winter. This is where keeping a journal is helpful; when you’re feeling distant from God, you can look back on times when God felt close. (It can also remind you to stick with the good choices you made.)
My Bad Decision: A Case Study
Let’s take an example of the “drop of water” and “making decisions in times of desolation” and see how those two insights work together. For that, I want to tell you about one of the worst decisions I’ve ever made. (That is quite a contest, by the way.)
One morning I came into our refugee center in Nairobi and discovered that someone had stolen our cash box, filled with tens of thousands of shillings (hundreds of U.S. dollars), equivalent to almost a week’s revenue for our handicraft shop. Furious, I summoned our staff—two refugees and two Kenyan locals—told them how betrayed I felt, and demanded that the malefactor confess immediately. Each of them vehemently denied any wrongdoing.
Infuriated, I drove to each of their houses to search for the cash box, a gravely insulting act in East African culture—in any culture. (As I said, Jesuits are not angels.)
For a few days I tried to pray about a course of action. But I was too angry. Every time I sat down to pray, I sprang up again and paced around my bedroom. Rather than focus on God and the movements of my soul, all I did was fume about this betrayal. (In my selfish state, I was angrier about someone betraying me than about the loss of funds for the refugee projects.) Though my Jesuit friends counseled patience, I ignored them and grew
increasingly intent on punishing someone. So I was closing out God and my friends, on a downward path, inviting desolation, and isolating myself from two ways that God communicates: prayer and friends.
Finally, someone advised that the best way to rectify this was to sack all of them. Fire them. Send a message to everyone that stealing will not be tolerated, he said. Yes! I thought gleefully. That would make things so easy. Here the evil spirit was encouraging me, like the drop of water on the sponge. “Go on,” it said. “It’s easy, isn’t it?”
So I fired everyone. How unjust that was—to punish each of them for the sins of only one. It was a wretched scene. All four wept and begged me to keep them on: each was already teetering on the edge of utter poverty. Our stormy meeting made me weep with frustration after they left the office and briefly made me wonder if I was doing the right thing. But I forcibly suppressed those feelings. Afterward I proudly told everyone what I had done—what a big man I was to stand up to those thieves!
The next morning I awoke with a start: What had I done? And I recognized this alarm bell as my conscience. I had gone from bad to worse, from anger to vengeance, from pride to injustice. And I saw— with a shock—that I had made a terrible mistake. It was the drop of water on the stone, “violent, noisy, and disturbing,” trying to wake me up. Trying to get the attention of my conscience.
Like Ignatius did in many cases, I changed course. Over the next few weeks, I hired back two of the employees, found another one a new job, and started to provide financial support for the last person (the one who was probably the culprit). In the end, I sought forgiveness and reconciled with each of them. Once I had done this, I felt a sense of peace.
What would Ignatius say? Well, I had made a poor decision in a time of desolation. The evil spirit had encouraged me along the wrong path, but fortunately the good spirit had woken me up “with perceptible noise.” And after I had changed course, I felt consolation, the confirmation of a good decision.
Three Ways the “Enemy” Works
We’ve talked about Ignatius’s worldview, with its images of the good spirit and the bad one. You still may find that antiquated, but he had a flawless understanding of the specific ways in which— take your pick—the “enemy,” the “evil spirit,” or, if you prefer, our “worst selves” are at work in our lives. And he identifies three main ways.
Over the past twenty years as a Jesuit, this has been the part of Ignatian spirituality that has been easiest for me to see in action. And once you’re familiar with it, you’ll begin to see it in yourself.
These are the three primary ways that the evil spirit works, slightly adapted from Ignatius’s Rules for Discernment.
First, the enemy conducts himself like a spoiled child. In this case the child is “weak when faced by firmness but strong in the face of acquiescence.” Frequently we find ourselves beset by what feels like a child within us. You think, “I want this! And I want it now!” Like a child screaming for another candy bar. If this overwhelming want is for something unhealthy, selfish, or even immoral, then it is important to recognize this for what it is. If part of you wants to jump into bed with another office worker, even though you’re both married, and you hear that babyish, demanding, petulant voice over and over in your head, you’re hearing this voice of the spoiled child. “I have to have sex with her, and I have to have it now!”
What’s the antidote? Do what you would do with a spoiled child: put your foot down on those temptations. You’ll find it effective. “The enemy characteristically weakens, loses courage, and flees with his temptations when the person engaged in spiritual endeavors stands bold and unyielding.”
Pity the parent who gives in to the spoiled child who keeps demanding more and more. And pity the person who doesn’t put his foot down with these kinds of selfish wants. The married man (or woman) who continually listens to that childish voice that says, “I have to have sex with that person!” risks falling into a devastating choice. If you begin to “fear and lose courage,” as Ignatius says, the temptations will only intensify. So put your foot down!
Second, the enemy acts like a false lover. Essentially, the enemy would prefer that temptations, doubts, and despairs be kept secret, which only makes things worse for the person.
Ignatius compares the enemy to a “scoundrel” who tries to “remain secret and undetected.” In a colorful passage he compares the enemy to a man intent on seducing a good wife away from her husband. (Let’s hope Ignatius was not speaking from an earlier experience!) The scoundrel wants his “words and solicitations” to remain secret, lest the husband finds out and puts things right.
In the same way, he writes, “When the enemy of human nature turns his wiles and persuasions upon an upright person, he intends and desires them to be received and kept in secrecy. But when the person reveals them to his or her good confessor or some other spiritual person . . . he is grievously disappointed. For he quickly sees that he cannot succeed.”
What’s the antidote here? Bring everything out in the open—all those negative feelings and temptations and urges to do wrong or to despair or to move away from God. Bring them out of that “box,” as David would say. Talk about them with a friend you trust, a counselor, or a spiritual director. You’ll see how those temptations, which seem so powerful when hidden within, quickly lose much of their power when they’re brought into the light of day.
How often this happens in spiritual direction! Someone seems to be dancing around some uncomfortable topic, something he is afraid of revealing, precisely because he knows that once it’s out in the open he will be challenged to recognize how unhealthy it is.
Once it’s revealed, the unhealthy urge, decision, or tendency can be examined, healed, or rejected. When a young Jesuit is tempted to break his vows in any way, for example, he often suppresses the desire to talk about his struggles with his superior or spiritual director, and the frustrations and fears and secrecy and problems only deepen.
“The devil never has greater success with us than when he works secretly and in the dark,” said Ignatius. Or, as members of Alcoholics Anonymous say, “You’re only as sick as your secrets.” As an aside, the spiritual director of Bill Wilson, one of the founders of A.A., was Father Edward Dowling, a Jesuit, which may explain why some of Ignatius’s insights may sound familiar to recovering addicts.
Finally, the enemy acts like an army commander. This is my favorite image, and one that most likely draws on Ignatius’s military background. The army commander knows exactly where our weak spots are and targets them. The army commander, when preparing to attack a castle, makes his camp, carefully studies his target’s weaknesses and strengths, and then attacks at the weakest point.
In the same way the evil spirit “prowls around” (1 Pet. 5:8) and studies where we are weakest, where we are most likely to be tempted, even in good times. “There he attacks and tries to take us,” writes Ignatius. In other words, the evil spirit will attack where you are most vulnerable. Is your pride your weak spot? In that case, when all is going well in your life, the evil spirit will try to attack you there. “When the devil wishes to attack anyone,” Ignatius wrote elsewhere, “he first of all looks to see on what side his defenses are weakest or in worst order; then he moves up his artillery to make a breach at that spot.”
Let’s say you’ve just started to care for your aging parent, a generous act. Little by little, others start telling you how noble you are. Then you start to think, I’m doing a good deed. So far, so good. But the army commander is looking for a way to get in. So, little by little, you move from I’m doing a good job to I’m such a good person. And from there to I’m so holy. And finally to I’m much holier than everyone else. You become self-righteous, proud, and arrogant. From there you may start to judge, condemn, and even hate others who are not as “holy” as you.
What happened? You may wonder, How did I get here? The evil spirit has succeeded in finding your weak point and is winning the battle.
What’s the best
defense against this? Shore up the weak parts of your spiritual castle. Pay special attention to the ways that you are tempted at your weak points, and work against those tendencies.
In time you’ll be able to predict the ways you’ll be tempted. For me, the temptations usually come in two ways: feeling lonely or worrying about my physical health. In the month before my ordination, for example, I found myself consumed with sexual desire. Then, just a week before, I ended up with a horrible virus, which plunged me into despair. It was almost comically easy to see how my weakest points were open for attack. So I shored up those points of my life, by making sure I spent time with my close friends and by reminding myself that health wasn’t the most important thing in life, and, on the day of my ordination, I marched happily up the aisle.
In time you’ll get to recognize those feelings. You’ll get to know when you’re being tempted to go down the wrong path.
The Angel of Light
That brings us to another Ignatian insight: the evil spirit can masquerade as the good spirit. That sounds like something out of a cheesy horror movie, but it’s a clearheaded insight into human nature. Simply put, it means that things that seem good to us can take a dramatically wrong turn and mask something darker. The evil spirit, says Ignatius, “takes on the appearance of an angel of light.”
Let’s take the case of a father who decides that he is going to pray more. He thinks he is doing this to be more contemplative and more loving as a husband and father. But perhaps his motives are not so pure. Perhaps unconsciously he wants to escape from his family. Gradually he becomes so consumed with his desire for prayer that he starts neglecting his wife and his children. Soon he grows bitter and resentful whenever his precious time in prayer is interrupted. “Get out!” he yells to his children, “I’m praying!” The evil spirit has subtly taken on the guise of the good spirit to draw the person into an attitude of bitterness.