“He was among wild beasts”

We must know our enemy. “In every warlike campaign, in every battle, the thing of chief importance is to be acquainted with the enemy, with his power and position, his plans, and the forces he has in reserve.” [1] The Devil, the world and the flesh are our enemy. C.S. Lewis in the Chronicles of Narnia does a great job of describing our enemy. The three movies, “The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (2005)”, “Prince Caspian (2008)”, and “The Voyage of the Dawn Treader (2010)” each focus on the enemy in the forms of the devil, the world and the flesh.

“The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe” is our fight against the devil, represented by the White Witch. It is the White Witch that has caused Narnia to be in a frozen (sinful) state. It is the witch that tempts Edmond with the Turkish delight and tries to pit the Sons of Adam and Daughters of Eve against each other and put an end to Aslan. This first movie can represent the time prior to the time of Christ’s coming when humanity was held captive by sin, in the state of cold and darkness.

“ Prince Caspian” is our fight against the world. With the defeat of the White Witch, Narnia experiences peace. With the coming of Jesus and His victory on the Cross, the world experiences peace. The evilness of men makes Narnia and the world a “savage place”. It is now, not the White Witch, but the Telmarines and their lust for pride and power that must be fought against.

“ Voyage of the Dawn Treader” is our fight against the flesh. Now that both the White Witch and the Telmarines have been conquered, each character must conquer their own sins / struggles. Each character struggles against the sins of the flesh. Lucy wants to be beautiful and is full of jealousy. Edmund is greedy and wants power. Prince Caspian is full of fear. Eustace is selfish and prideful. The Green Mist represents the flesh, the seven deadly sins that enslave us all.
 
What is common in all three movies? There is an enemy. There is a struggle, a flight. There is victory. There is peace. This is the story of the Life of Christ. “In his short account of the temptations (Mk 1:13), Mark brings into relief the parallels between Adam and Jesus, stressing how Jesus ‘suffers through’ the quintessential human drama. Jesus, we read, ‘was with the wild beasts; and the angels ministered to him’ (Mk 1:13). The desert – the opposite image of the garden – becomes the place of reconciliation and healing. Wild beasts are the most concrete threat that the rebellion of creation and the power of death posed to man. But there they become man’s friends, as they once were in paradise. Peace is restored, the peace that Isaiah proclaims for the days of the Messiah: ‘The wolf shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid’ (Is 11:6).” [2]

We can become paranoid and think that everything is our enemy or we can take the opposite view and believe nothing is our enemy; both are wrong. In this video, Rage Against the Machine takes the approach of the paranoid, making it appear that everything is our enemy. Compromise, conformity, assimilation, submission, hypocrisy, brutality, and the elite are listed among the enemies. Some of these are evil, but not all. Saint Paul tells us, “do not conform yourselves to this age but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and pleasing and perfect.” [3] Yes, we do not conform to this world, but we do conform to Christ, which is conformity. We are submissive. Submission is “sub” or under the “mission”, we are under the mission of Christ. If we begin to believe that everything and everyone is our enemy, then we cannot focus on our true enemy, the devil, the world and the flesh.
 
If we are focused on everyone else as our enemy, we forget that we can be our own worst enemy. We sin in our thoughts, desires and actions. If we look back at the garden we see three characters, the serpent, Eve and Adam. “The serpent suggested to the mind of Eve the idea of breaking the command of God; Eve took pleasure in the thought, and advised Adam to carry it into action; Adam followed her advice and sinned. The first beginning of an evil thought may be compared to the suggestions of the serpent. Eve represents the lower nature, which takes delight in the contemplation of sin; in the person of Adam we see the human will, which, agreeing to the proposal of Eve, completes the sinful act.” [4]

The devil then is always suggesting, sowing the thoughts that we should go against God, that we should not trust God. This is our first enemy. The pleasure or desire that the thought brings about, represented by Eve, is our battle against the flesh. The choice, the free will to complete the sinful act is played out in the world. In the world, we see many people acting sinfully, and proposing a sin to us.  Will we agree to the proposal as Adam did or will we disagree as Jesus did?

Christ has come to save our soul. If we don’t know what a soul is, then we don’t know what Christ has come to save.  What does our soul consist of? Our soul consists of our intellect (thoughts) and our will (actions). Christ has therefore come to save our thoughts and actions, our intellect and will from the destruction of the enemy. It is the devil, the world and the flesh

The battle for our thoughts and actions is summed up in the Gospel of John. “A thief comes only to steal and slaughter and destroy; I came so that they might have life and have it more abundantly.” [5] The devil’s goal is to steal, slaughter and destroy our thoughts and actions.  How does the devil, steal, slaughter and destroy our thoughts and actions? He does this through our flesh (the desire to turn against God) and the world (temptations and bad influences). We can look in our life and see that anything that steals slaughters and destroys holy thoughts or actions is in reality stealing, slaughtering and destroying our soul. The salvation of our souls, the holiness of our thoughts and actions is so important to Jesus, that He goes into battle immediately. The first action of his public ministry is to go into battle one on one against the devil and while at battle He resists both the flesh and the world.

The Gospel says, “The Spirit drove Jesus out into the desert”. The Spirit will also drive us out into the desert, out into the fight against the devil, the world and the flesh.  Will we go into battle with Christ? Will we fight the good fight through Him, with Him and in Him? It is Christ that shows us how to not only fight, but how to win, without Him, there is no victory. The communion antiphon, taking from Psalm 91, gives us the surety that as we enter the desert, we will have both the protection and shelter of the almighty God. “He will overshadow you with his pinions, and you will find refuge under his wings. His faithfulness will encompass you with a shield.”
 

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[1] Father Lasance; The Young Man’s Guide
[2] Pope Benedict XVI; Jesus of Nazareth
[3] Romans 12:2
[4] Father Lasance; The Young Man’s Guide
[5] John 10:10