TRANSCRIPT:
Good afternoon. Today I want to chat about diabolical disorientation. Now, I first heard this term when I was very young, probably 30 years ago, and it was used by Sister Lúcia of Fátima fame and some of her writings.
I never really understood what ‘diabolical disorientation’ might mean until very recently. I was thinking about our world that we live in today in 2020 with the Wuhan virus, with the economic collapse, with the shutdowns that have affected everything from school to work to church, the situation of our Church with poor leadership and mass apostasy. Even now, churches are shut down, in some places communion is not available or people are even banned from kneeling. So there’s enormous suffering, confusion, and an overwhelming sense of fear in our world. It seems to me that this is diabolical disorientation.
So what do we do when we are disoriented? Well, I think the first thing we do is ask for help. We ask for help from someone near us, someone we trust. “Help me out, I’m disoriented.” And so in a spiritual sense, we’ve got to go to our guardian angels first, we’ve got to go to our patron saints, to Saint Joseph and, of course, to Our Lady and ask for help constantly throughout the day as we’re feeling the effects of this disorientation.
Secondly, when we’re disoriented, we flee to safety. We want to go back to some place that we are comfortable and we know is safe. We might need help getting back there. So in our spiritual life, what does this mean? We’ve got to flee from sin and temptation- even of the most minor kind- and we’ve got to get back to the basics of our prayer life and to fasting and those disciplines.
And the final thing, it seems to me- if we’re truly disoriented, if you’ve ever been sick, if you’ve ever been nauseous and you get dizzy and so forth, what do you do? You go find that favorite chair that you’re comfortable in, and you just want to sit still and just regain your senses. And it seems to me that in this time where we might be tempted all sorts of new and exotic things, especially if we’re trying to grow in our spiritual life, if we’re dealing with that anxiety and fear, we’re starting to feel that pressure, then maybe it’s just time to get really simple go back to our mental prayer. Perhaps even just meditate on the words of the Our Father one word at a time, like St. Therese did, and spend that time in that simplistic, quiet prayer, opening ourselves up to the grace and influence of our Lord. We’ve got a double down on the simple stuff during these difficult times, and let’s regain that piece of Christ and the indwelling of the Holy Ghost in our souls and our lives so that we can be a good example to others.
Have a great day.