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Question
Good morning father,
I was browsing for topics about possession and obsession, when I ended up on this website. I am hoping for an answer from you.
After spending some years as the perfect church woman, wife, and mother, I changed personality: I started distancing myself from my husband and from my son, I stopped attending church, meanwhile I began feeling a sense of dissatisfaction which I try to fulfill by craving attention from other men and by dreaming about new relationships.
I obtained men’s attention, and even though I never corresponded, that sensation flattered me.
Before all of this happened, I used to say as a joke that the devil was envious of my purity, that even if he was tempting me through all those men, my capacity to resist temptations made me gain a place in Heaven, and that for sure a niche was already been reserved to me in Vatican.
Everything changed when, one day, I realized that a very handsome co-worker was interested in me. That day, our eyes met for a moment: he morbidly looked at me in a way that, at that time, I tought it was admiration, but then, over the years, I realized it was just sex.
He turned out to be a sick person, addicted to betrayal, pornography, casual sex, extreme sex practices of all kinds.
As a matter of fact, my life has changed since that day. I began to think obsessively about him, day and night. I couldn’t stop myself from thinking of him, even though I knew that it was wrong.
My mind was completely absorbed by him, by the dream of a love, or even just a sex affair with him. I was constantly thinking about the moment I would have cheated on my husband with him: I couldn’t wait to make it happen!
I provoked him and I looked back for him, until finally I allowed him to approach me. All of my dreams about my adventure with him materialized in what I would describe as a frightening loss of my personality: I did things that are not in my nature.
For him, I abandoned my morals and beliefs. How did it end? He used me and then abandoned me, and yet, I continue to obsessively desire him.
I want to get rid of thinking about him, but I can’t. I do not recognize myself anymore. I am seeing a psychologist, but the treatment seems to fail for now. I keep going saying to my therapist that I feel I became crazy, instead, she tells me that it is merely a problem of intimate dissatisfaction, that I have probably stopped loving my husband, that eventually I should accept my real, inner nature, as we all have unaccepted parts in ourselves. According to her, my old-self was not a genuine one.
But I know she is not right, because the way I experienced the extramarital relationship had those features like obsession and compulsion, which are typical of a psychic pathology.
I therefore wonder if what happened to me could be a diabolical obsession; in case of an affirmative answer, how can I get rid of it?
I prayed, and I had masses said for me.
Please, tell me how to get rid of this desire of attracting males and cheat my husband with them.
The priest’s answer
Dear reader,
1. Perhaps you had an exaggerated consideration of yourself, that is, of being the perfect woman, wife, and mother.
The truth is that none of us is perfect. We all are continuously threatened by so many imperfections, defects and falls, at least venial ones.
That is why the Holy Spirit says through the mouth of Paul: “whoever thinks he is standing secure should take care not to fall” (1Cor 10:12).
You were too confident about yourself. You thought you were perfect. Instead, you ruinously crashed, and you were humiliated.
2. At the garden of olive trees, before leaving his disciples before his passion, the Lord told them: “Watch and pray that you may not undergo the test” (Mk 14:38).
Even when we live in chastity, in order to preserve our purity it is always necessary that we pray to God to give us the necessary strength, because no one can be chaste, if God does not give him/her the strength. In fact, nobody is able to resist all temptations and all mortal sins by his/her own strength.
3. Temptation came when you least expected it because you forgot what the Holy Spirit said through St. Peter’s mouth: “Be sober and vigilant. Your opponent the devil is prowling around like a roaring lion looking for (someone) to devour. Resist him, steadfast in faith” (1Pt 5:8-9).
You were quiet, defenseless, and without strength, while your enemy was prowling around you like a roaring lion.
4. Now, you find yourself chained up and you cannot free yourself.
When in mortal sin, we become slaves to sin, and getting out of it becomes harder and harder.
The Lord said: “Amen, amen, I say to you, everyone who commits sin is a slave of sin” (Jn 8:34).
“This kind of slavery is the worst” comments St. Thomas, “because as St. Augustine wrote (In Io. Ev., 41,4): ‘A slave of man, when worn out by the harsh commands of his master, can find relief in flight; but a slave of sin drags his sin with him, wherever he flees: for the sin he did is within him. The pleasure passes, the sin (the act of sin) passes; what gave pleasure has gone, what wounds have remained.’ ” (Commentary on John 8:34).
5. While that is true for every mortal sin, it is especially true for the sin of lust.
St. Thomas writes: “The devil is said to rejoice chiefly in the sin of lust, because it is of the greatest adhesion (dependence), and man can with difficulty be withdrawn from it, “For the desire of pleasure is insatiable”, as the Philosopher Aristotle states [1] (Ethics to Nicomachus, 3,12) (Summa Theologiae, I-II, 73, 5, ad 2).
Pietro da Bergamo, in the Tabula aurea, writes “propter difficultatem evadendi” (for the difficulty in getting out of it) [2].
6. St. Thomas also says that no one can get out of this state by his own strength: “anyone who falls into mortal sin by his own will places himself in a state from which he cannot be snatched unless divinely assisted” (Sentences, IV D.46, q.1, a.3).
7. Naturally, God’s help could come through different forms, like the support from a psychologist. But this kind of help is always of a natural order.
You, on the other hand, need supernatural help and strength.
And these are ordinarily communicated by the sacrament of Confession.
8. Therefore, humbly return to confession, penance, vigilance, and prayer.
Do remember what the Lord said: “But this kind [t.n.: of demons] does not come out except by prayer and fasting” (note for Mt 17:21; rf. Mk 9:29). Here fasting is synonymous with any penance.
He also recalls God’s invitation already expressed in the Old Testament: “All you who are thirsty, come to the water! You who have no money, come, receive grain and eat; Come, without paying and without cost, drink wine and milk! Why spend your money for what is not bread; your wages for what fails to satisfy?” (Is 55:1-2).
When you confess, there is no confessor fee you should give. At no cost, God communicates to you grace, which is a divine energy, a supernatural strength.
By means of it, you receive that power by which you can break the paralyzing bonds that cause your torment.
I assure you my prayers, so that you can do so as soon as possible.
I wish you every good and I bless you.
Father Angelo
NOTES
1 Aristotle.
2 “Diabolus dicitur maxime gaud de sin luxuriae, quia est maximae adhaerentiae, et difficile ab eo homo potest eripi, insatiabilis est enim delectabilis appetitus ut philosophus dicit, in III Ethic. 12.7″ (Summa Theologiae, I-II, 73, 5, ad 2).Pietro da Bergamo writes in the Tabula aurea: “propter difficultatem evadendi” (for the difficulty in getting out of it).