Fr. Andrew Younan, a holy priest and friend of Catholic Answers, has a superb Sunday homily posted on YouTube with the title “God Works Slowly and Quietly.” In it, he examines the contrast in Matthew 7 “between God’s works and the works of evil,” and in doing so unearths some solid gold nuggets of practical advice for the spiritual life. I implore you to listen to the full eleven minutes.
Broadly, Fr. Younan’s point is that the life of God in us, as illustrated by our Lord, grows like a tree—slow, boring, and needing persistent and mundane cultivation. In contrast, the enemy loves to distract us from that work with drama and bombast: “Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?” (Matt. 7:22). Here’s the part that resonated with me most:
“Spiritual battle!” People love the idea of spiritual battle. And there is spiritual battle, absolutely. You know what spiritual battle is? You’re mad at your brother, and your temptation is to, y’know, get into a fight, and you resist that temptation. That’s spiritual battle. It’s so boring. And that’s how God works: in these little, tiny, boring things.
Dead on. The language of “spiritual battle” or “spiritual warfare” can be misleading to modern ears. It makes sanctification sound like a flashy sword duel against cackling demons, with a tongue of fire on your head; but Fr. Younan and our Lord illustrate it quite differently. It’s a slow, steady, interior grind against your weaknesses. Praying every day, resisting temptation, and pursuing virtue. Taking up your cross. It bears repeating: that’s boring.
The devil is there, for sure, but for the 99.99 percent of us who aren’t as holy as a Padre Pio, John Vianney, or Teresa of Avila, he doesn’t need to do anything bombastic. In fact, he probably knows that tormenting us with Exorcist-like horrors would send us sprinting into the protective arms of our heavenly Father! No, it’s so much simpler: he just pokes and prods us at our weak points. As Fr. Younan says later, “You need to worry about your gossip and your envy and your pride. That’s where the devil’s attacking you.”
This resonates with me deeply for two reasons. First, I’ve experienced it. By the grace of God and solid spiritual direction, I pray almost every day now; but forming and maintaining that habit is hard. Every morning, it demands a new “Yes” to God and “No” to myself. I have to battle my enslavement to Twitter and YouTube. On the days I win the battle and enter prayer, I’m usually pestered by mental distractions. And nearly every time, there’s no warm fuzzies or audible divine voice to immediately reward me. I enter, I sit with God, and I leave.
In the moment, it’s boring and I don’t “feel” like I’m getting anything out of it. But Jesus says that’s how the spiritual life grows, so I keep showing up; and every now and then, I look back at where I used to be, and I see how the tree has grown. It’s a humbling reminder of God’s slow, silent, tremendous power.
And that leads to the second reason: God renews the Church by raising up saints, which is why becoming a saint is the single most important thing any of us can do with our lives. But becoming a saint is intensely personal. It requires constant, regular self-reflection and self-denial. It requires asking God to let us see ourselves as he does. It requires total surrender to his will. It requires a hundred more things I don’t know yet. But how on earth can we do any of that if we spend all our time looking for a sword to fight the devil with instead of a grindstone?