Tempted to be Selfish

The texts of the Roman Catholic Lectionary for the 1st Sunday of Lent bring some reflection on temptation. The story of Adam and Eve from the Book of Genesis tells us the awareness they have of their nakedness after they eat of the forbidden fruit of the “Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil”. Larry Gillick, S.J. of the Deglman Center for Ignatian Spirituality sees the decision to not listen to God as the a consequence of our great lust for self knowledge coupled with our pride and God –envy to do it by ourselves. The knowledge we acquire through self satisfaction may be unclear and an unreliable measure of our being and we may feel uncertain and uncomfortable with the consequence of following the advice of internal serpents that we do not need the intimate communion with the Divine. In fact, when we lose sight of our Divine connection we understand nakedness and the discomfort of the visibility of our weaknesses. The appeal of the psalmist to be restored to the joy of the relationship with God concludes with the recognition that the spirit broken by disconnection from listening to God is the disposition which precedes the restoration of the communication between the indwelling Spirit and the Divine. Paul addresses the Romans with a magnificent comparison of the selfish act in the tradition of Adam which brought condemnation and the selfless act of Jesus which restored the intimacy with the Father through the free gift to all humanity. The episode in Matthew’s Gospel of the temptation of Jesus in the desert is an example of the grace and power in maintaining the connection with the Divine through which we acquire knowledge of our “real” being. That being finds its fulfillment in the relationship with the Divine and is alert to the false self that will seek development in directions away from listening to the indwelling Spirit. Gillick identifies pride, envy and lust for certainty through power as the temptations presented in the Gospel today.