It’s Holy Thursday. I feel like this Holy Week (indeed, this Lent) is winding down too soon in a cloud of apathy for me.
I’ve been off my feed the past couple of weeks; my prayer routine has been off, my sleep schedule has gone awry, and I’ve generally felt physically and emotionally blah. I’ve had moments where life in front of me felt cloudy and dark.
I blame unwise timing of coffee consumption for the sleep problems. The other stuff? I suspect mild depression and being under attack, spiritually speaking.
This started a few weeks ago, after a bit of a spiritual high with a powerful Lenten retreat at my parish. After that, I found myself distracted more than usual during Mass, irritated (more than normal) by the people around me, and increasingly opting to skip morning or evening prayers. I did have some moments of connection during a few adoration visits, but then I’d slip up again.
This description of a spiritual attack resonates with my recent experience:
When I was actively under attack, I experienced fear, doubt, sleep disturbances, extreme fatigue, and a debilitating lack of concentration. There was a lot of confusion and obsessive thoughts that interfered with my ability to think or communicate clearly. I also suffered from depression mostly, because I could no longer feel God and believed He had abandoned me. As a result, I isolated myself from others and began to look for Jesus. It was difficult to complete tasks, and I often wondered what was wrong with me. The sleep deprivation left me weak and susceptible to further and more heinous attacks. This is not everything that happened to me, but it should be enough to help you understand what an attack is like.
What to do? My first thought has been to try powering through – at least try to resume what little prayer routine I have (morning offering, Angelus, prayer of daily neglects) and keep going to Mass. I’ve also been praying the St. Michael prayer with Frannie every night, since CCD has been drilling that into her head for much of the year.
I can’t say I’m out of my funk entirely, but I’m convinced that I’d be a lot worse off if I hadn’t done any of these things. And I feel like there’s a light at the end of the proverbial tunnel. That a glimmer of light is emerging as Easter nears just adds to my optimism.
Grateful to see some decent articles online about this kind of thing:
- The Spiritual Battle: How Satan Tempts Us and What We Can Do to Resist (CatholicLink)
- Peter Kreeft: On Spiritual Warfare (CatholicEducation.org)
- Jen Fulwiler: We Need to Talk To Converts About Spiritual Attack (National Catholic Register)
- Priests vs. Demons: How You Become Open to Attacks (Inquirer)
- Msgr. Charles Pope: A Late Lenten Meditation on the Reality of Spiritual Warfare (Catholic Standard)
The non-spiritually inclined among us will scoff at all this. But I firmly believe this stuff is real. Sure, I’ve always had issues with irritability and depression and fatigue – though in the case of the latter, that has diminished significantly with my recent weight loss. But there’s a dark dimension to the past few weeks that’s weird to me.
But I’m going to trudge ahead because I need to. And I’m hanging onto that Easter hope.