The Greatest Temptation People Face – Father Theologos

What is the greatest temptation people face, the very one with which the devil tempted Christ Himself? What forms does this temptation take today, at the beginning of the 21st century, in the era of electronics, especially for young people?

Watch this video to find out.

Enjoy!

Glory to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit, now and ever and unto the ages of ages. Amen. Through the prayers of our Holy Fathers, Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on us! Amen.

So far, we have talked about the two great temptations of our Lord Jesus Christ by the devil. Now we will discuss the third one, which is also the greatest, focusing, as usual, on the practical side, on what we can do to become better. What was His greatest temptation? Obviously, it was the one where the devil took the Lord to a very high mountain, as the scripture says, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory and said to the Lord, “All this authority I will give You, and their glory (as it says in Scripture); for this has been delivered to me (the devil says this), and I give it to whomever I wish. Therefore, if You will worship before me, all will be Yours.” Chapters 4 of Matthew and Luke and chapter 1 of Mark, if I am not mistaken. This means that the devil offered all matter, all wealth, the whole world from a material point of view just to subdue the soul of Christ.

You see that the devil has no rights over us. We must give them to him, we must agree. This is the great secret of the devil, brethren! That he can’t do anything. Only tempt! Be very careful, brothers! Do not believe the thoughts and let’s not agree with the devil. Returning to the event in the Gospel, Christ rightly – and we must do the same, brothers – He correctly used the incensive part of His soul saying, “Get behind Me, Satan! For it is written, ‘You shall worship the Lord your God, and Him only you shall serve.’”

We use anger against the evil within us – in Christ, of course, there is none – and we also use it against the devil as the source of evil and not against the others, brothers. The Savior used it only against the devil as the source of evil because He had no evil within Himself. Our freedom comes from serving the Being who is perfectly free, perfectly loving, and not from serving the devil who is perfectly trapped in his selfishness, perfectly limited.

Returning to temptation, know that this is what he does to each of us. He offers us, so to speak, the whole world – of course, according to our measures – if only we submit to him. Of course, for us, the whole world offered by the devil means much less. It is about our passions, what we desire most, what we strive for, our thoughts. Does someone desire success in business? The devil will tempt him with that. Does someone else desire success in art – in music or film and so on? The enemy will lure him there. Power? Fame? Bodily pleasures? The devil will tempt him where he has his weak point, that is, where a person tends to absolutize things, where a person idolizes a goal, has an ideal outside God. The devil attacks there. The devil knows that nothing is more precious than human freedom and makes one renounce it for the sake of illusions or transient things that cannot fulfill a person.

You see that the devil claims that “…this has been delivered to me, and I give it to whomever I wish” – now, in reality, there is some truth in this statement, which makes it very dangerous. From a dogmatic point of view, of course, creation belongs to God, Who has given it as a gift to man, and man, through his folly, has handed it over to the devil; however, this devilish dominion is illusory, ambiguous, changeable, it’s not real dominion and therefore those who believe they rule the world or – to be more precise – their world, are actually never at peace. They feel this changeable, illusory nature. They are continuously troubled due to this pseudo-dominion which not only has a partial character but also a temporary one. Meaning it disappears. And because of this, those who wish to dominate everyone and everything are not peaceful.

Before moving a little further in the analysis of this great temptation which, brethren, as I said, threatens us all – we must be careful not to fall into it. On the other hand, as I said, let’s be careful not to believe our thoughts and let’s not think that any person who is in an enviable position according to our more or less fallen logic is necessarily there because they have submitted to the devil! That is, if someone has a certain power, let us not think that it necessarily comes from the devil. We don’t judge people, brethren! No way!

You see that Abraham, David, and Job were in such positions. After Christ, we even have holy emperors, the great Holy Martyr Constantine Vodă Brâncoveanu together with his family and the Holy Counselor Ianache. Of course, [there is ] St. Stephen the Great, Michael the Brave, who was also a man with a very holy life, brethren, and the list could go on. In the artistic realm, we have so many great saints who had a phenomenal voice and compositional talent – just to mention St. John Damascene who, nota bene, was also the finance minister of the caliph plus the dogmatic basis of the 7th Ecumenical Synod. St. Romanos the Melodist, St. John Cucuzel, and others – but now I don’t want to go on at length here.

I want to emphasize that we cannot judge people, but we must guard ourselves against evil, to focus on spirituality, and be very careful of this temptation of the devil when he offers us the whole world, supposedly. God Himself said, “Render to Caesar what belongs to Caesar, and to God what belongs to God.” Of course, Christ knew how sinful the Caesar of that time, – Tiberius – was, the orgies and what sexual distortions he indulged in, and yet He said to give our material duties to the political leadership so that we can fully engage in spiritual matters, unimpeded. The moment the political leadership interferes with spirituality, things change completely. Do you understand? People are very bothered by this topic, sometimes even scandalized, but what is very interesting here is the fact that those who are bothered – please, forgive me for putting it this way! – are those who are not so much concerned with spiritual matters, but with money, and they regret giving money to others and envy those in power.

Of course, it is not good at all when people are excessively exploited, but, brethren, we must always keep the spiritual life – life in Christ – at the forefront. And in fact, when people are over-exploited, it is then that, because of material worries, they distance themselves from spirituality, from Christ, from God.  And then revolution, turmoil is near. Do you understand? To escape from the exploitation, from the power that weighs people down. As you can see, this last temptation is based on man’s tendency to have vertical relationships – to master and to avoid being mastered. In fact, the devil exploits man’s tendency to become like God, to become all-powerful. This desire is rooted in us, and therefore the devil cannot destroy it, he cannot twist it. Yet he tries to twist it and how does he twist it? He distorts it. So man always wants to become like God, and the devil distorts it, meaning he offers him another path. And let’s see how he does this concretely. Of course, in a word, he does as it is written in Matthew and Luke in chapter 4, that is, he offers man everything he desires materially to subjugate his soul – the whole world, that is, according to the mind of each of us – but the devil, being a rational being, knows that man will not accept it, and because of this, he will make the offer progressively bigger, stronger so that the man, being lured, can no longer resist. In other words, for the man should be so excited, to desire it so much, that he can no longer think, can no longer resist, to be completely drawn away from God.

At one point, a young man came here in a group that had a reservation for several days, and on the very first day he came, he could not stay put, he wanted to leave. In the evening, with tears in his eyes, he begged me to [let him] go – even though, of course, God forbid! – I was not keeping him, and it did not depend on me whether he stayed or not, he was free, but he was crying because he had to let out that he could no longer endure it. He begged me with tears in his eyes to [let him] leave because here, with us, there is too much silence, there’s peace. Do you understand? He was in a state of agitation, desperately seeking material excitement as he was used to in the world, in the European country where he lives, he was Romanian, but not from Romania. And because he couldn’t find these dopamine, adrenaline, serotonin centers here, he continuously sought this world he was addicted to. Well, brethren, for me, it was the icon of hell.

To be alone with yourself, surrounded by the love of other people and of God, yet to be focused on the centers of pleasure, the centers of material and selfish excitement that you have become accustomed to from your world that the devil has given you, supposedly, dominion over – when, in fact, you are dominated by the enemy and by these passions. Do you understand? That boy is a very good boy, and I talked to him and told him, “You know that if you die now, you will have this state for eternity? I tell you this with much love.” Gradually, he calmed down a little in the following days. And he actually left very joyful.

Basically, this is done through the educational system. When I say “the educational system,” I don’t just think of school – of course, that is part of it – but of everything a person learns from early childhood onward. Family is first, or, better said, it should be. Now, of course, we are not discussing the extreme cases where parents intentionally teach their children to do wrong, though, sadly, such cases do exist. The greatest problem today is that parents abandon their children to screens— phones, tablets, and computers. And as a result, children are raised not by their parents, but by father-cell phone and mother-tablet. Folks, don’t do this to get rid of your children and say that “He’s behaving.” You will pay dearly later, especially if we’re talking about a small child.

That’s why I said that family should be at the forefront and it’s not, because today we see that a young person’s family are [computer] chips, electronics and screens. Contemporary Holy Fathers have prophesied on this subject. They did not mention a specific [computer] chip, of a brand… NXP or Infineon… or those in PCs… Intel and AMD… All right? Rather, they speak of the electronics that subjugate man. Do you understand?

This will destroy their attention span, the young person will have a very fast, chaotic, and very, very superficial thinking, they will have a very reduced attention span, they will learn only things of the flesh without a spiritual perspective – you know very well that today the agenda being promoted is one obsessed with the flesh, brethren, I cannot say otherwise. You know very well what I mean. Do you understand?

The biggest problem though, especially for young people, is that all of this is promoted in a way that excitement, physical pleasure, shock, and the dopamine rush are pushed as far as they can go, and thus young people live in an almost continuous drugged state, more or less intense depending, of course, on what they consume. I sadly note that today Orthodoxy no longer appears primarily as the path to holiness, although it is, but as the only way for someone to keep their head on their shoulders – to be normal, brethren.

Before I focus on the electronics of the young person and – in general – of man detached from family, I would like to talk a little about school where this diabolical system of thinking is becoming increasingly evident, and I do not mean to imply that it is the fault of the teachers themselves – but of an educational system obsessed with the flesh that comes from outside Orthodoxy and from outside Romania and is trying to impose itself in order to destroy the purity of children. On the other hand, generally speaking, children who from home are already used to being addicted to mobile phones, that is, to apps and games, and are no longer paying attention in class… ultimately it even happens that they leave school without their parents’ knowledge. Well, yes, the teachers know, but they have almost no authority. I hope it’s not like that and of course there are happy cases, but unfortunately from what I hear, the situation is generally tragic in schools.

To the young people, I address you, my dear ones, perhaps I should speak a little more spiritually, but I’m afraid it may come across as incomprehensible… For this reason, I will tell you simply, at the grassroots level: my dear ones, tomorrow you will have to work. To make a living. And to work, you don’t just need to know how to carry a tray at some restaurant, at McDonald’s. You need to know how to do this better than the person next to you who also wants to be hired. And not only does he know how to carry the tray better, he has a better CV than you, and if he has a better CV than you, you won’t even be tested. Forgive me, but this is the reality. When the employer has in front of him I don’t know how many documents, he won’t look at you, he won’t have compassion for you. I’m not saying it’s good, brethren, I’m not happy about it, but we need to be a bit realistic.

Do you understand? Beyond that, as a wake-up call, don’t forget that we have already entered quite well into what most call the “4th industrial revolution” and many jobs will be taken over by robotics and electronics. So it will be very hard for you to get hired, especially in a position you desire, if you don’t go through schooling. But, alright, let’s say you do get hired: Forgive me for saying this, but if you are scattered and full of passions, and full of adrenaline, who will keep you employed? And if they do keep you, they will pay you little or the company will decline if it relies on you because your attention span and thinking will be very reduced. It will be a toxic atmosphere and in the end, you will still end up in an undesirable environment and will have problems in life if you don’t learn at the right time and especially if you don’t refine your character. Brethren, the devil knows what he is doing. Yes, okay, you will tell me that at school the education system should be better. Yes, I know that. I have even said it before. Brethren, choose the best school possible, with the best teachers to have as role models. Here I’m talking about spiritual role models. Role models who will teach you how to think and how to be spiritual personalities, not just money chasers. I don’t know how else to put it, please forgive me! It is very difficult because we do not know what is hidden behind each person, but it is very important to have spiritual examples, so that we do not fall into this great temptation of this world that we are now discussing, meaning to submit to the enemy for money and pleasure even without knowing it.

You know, things are very subtle, because demonic energy comes gradually and on logical grounds. You say that the stars of this world, influential people of all kinds, are anti-Christian and/or satanists – I emphasize here the demonic influences of an artistic nature, mainly referring to singers and actors because today they are much more influential over young people than politicians. Yes, brothers, okay, although we cannot judge people – that is clear – the Lord has said it, and I gave you good examples at the beginning of the word, it’s clear that this anti-Christian spirit that comes from the so-called cultural pole of the world is very satanic, brethren, and we must beware.

Now, as I was saying, things are very delicate, because undoubtedly many of these people speak about values accepted by the majority, they have very great natural charisms from God, such as voice – that’s a charism from God – oratory talent, a certain sharpness of mind, physical beauty, which is why they stand out among the others. However, wanting more and more, they are not careful and, unfortunately, do not know Orthodoxy and therefore do not have the necessary enlightenment and experience in their minds; they enter this path where the enemy offers them supposedly everything, if they submit to him. You see that even in the case of movies, brothers, and here I also include cartoons, unfortunately, it started with so-called innocent films, and today we end up with movies full of brutality, fleshly sin, and occultism all wrapped up in an extremely exciting form. Meanwhile, in music, or rather in anti-music, we have some lyrics and clips – some of them – that are completely unqualifiable. I’m even ashamed to talk about this. Brothers, as I said, you must know that this temptation is valid for us too, of course, keeping the proportions. You see, for this reason, the Holy Fathers say to cut off our will, not to desire anything; So that the enemy does not snare us. Do you understand?

Now, how does the enemy offer us “the whole world” just to submit to him? When, to put it this way, we do not have a beautiful voice… In the past, it was through evil thoughts, cunning ideas, intrigues that, which, for an ordinary person often remained unfulfilled because the person would say: well, I can’t do it, even if I wanted to. Of course, this is still valid today. And the person limits themselves to adultery or God forbid, sins of that kind which are serious… However, today this way has taken on a new dimension: the screen and electronics. I mentioned earlier about the contemporary art as a great temptation, including for those of us who wish to resemble the stars promoted by mass media and current social networks.

I’ve also talked in the past about TikTok as the most powerful weapon on earth right now, considering that it has the greatest power for mass destruction of people’s minds through everything it promotes and how it promotes it, backed by a very harmful Artificial Intelligence algorithm that destroys our minds by maximizing pleasure and minimizing the interval at which this fleshly pleasure, this dopamine rush is delivered. I briefly mentioned this at the beginning of this talk; I won’t return to it. All I’m saying now is that, unfortunately, other platforms are also following this trend, each platform having its own implementation of these short videos, with increasingly frequent and intense dopamine rushes.

Now, however, I want to talk about a new stronger weapon, a new beast through which the devil offers us all, so to speak, “the whole world” just as long as we submit to him, meaning to selfishness, brutality, and hatred. Brethren, I’m talking about computer games. Brethren, I hope I’m wrong, but it seems that young generations are almost destroyed by computer games. Almost everyone plays on their phones at school and beyond, learning everything that is destructive – they act brutally and immediately without thinking. This is to be expected because in the vast majority of games, the player deals with a very hostile, antagonistic, warlike environment that excites them to the maximum and he earns points, prizes, and is rewarded if he kills others, torments others, if it is brutal, and of course, this is very easy while sitting in their gaming chair. I’m not sure if you know, there are world championships with lots and lots of money for that. I don’t know if you know, but in 2022 alone, the gaming industry had – yes, brethren, I looked into this – revenues of around 200 billion dollars – half of which came from mobile games.

The game industry has higher expenses and revenues than Hollywood, and that’s to be expected because if a movie you watch as a spectator generates so much addiction, so many thoughts, then even more so do the games in which someone is an integral part – especially today when virtual reality headsets – Oculus and so on – and the almost complete realism of graphics come into force. We have phenomenal graphics cards today and phenomenal graphics chips, offering young people a totally immersive experience that profoundly changes a person, frying their mind, teaching them all the sins through immense pleasure – including killing and torturing people and, whatever, monsters – because regardless of who the opponent is, hatred and brutality are actually cultivated within us. Of course, on top of all this, many blatantly demonic elements, occultism, magic, spiritism, spells, and similar things are added. All of these in a quasi-real environment that completely transforms the young person from bad to worse, flooding him in that total pleasure caused by “their world” offered by the devil.

The devil offers a world as perfect as possible to ensnare man, to enslave man. I remind you that at this moment, by far the main (if not the only) driving force pushing forward the computer and mobile phone industry is the game industry. So not Word and Excel and talking on the phone. Games push development forward. We have some super-processors right now, we wouldn’t need such things if it weren’t for the games. Unfortunately, brothers, I haven’t heard of many games that cultivate virtue and peace, almsgiving, but I have heard of very popular games that teach you to steal cars and commit many other sins – to kill. Yes, brethren, GTA – Grand Theft Auto – What a name for a game… It’s a totally destructive game. God forbid! Don’t play such a game!

Of course, most of them are the ones where you kill others or think you’re someone, playing a brutal role of a superhero, a tough guy, not in the gentle, spiritual sense, but in the sense of a warrior, a savage. Brethren, let’s be clear, the gaming industry does not focus on Chess or Go. It would be nice if it did. Ultimately, these can also be played outside the world of [computer] chips. The big problem for those pushing the buttons in this industry, is that these games in real life do not generate addiction and a break from reality does not exist, but, on the contrary, the person is present, with his friends, he socializes, has unity with others, and this generates a friendship between colleagues, love.  Those in the games industry don’t like that.

Yes, okay, now you will tell me that there are strategy games on the computer or in which each has their own role, some of which are softer – yes. But there are others… may the good God forbid! I know cases where someone was about to destroy their life, losing entire years of their life, a person with a family and children, because of a very well-known and highly addictive, obsessive strategy game. I shouldn’t mention its name to avoid giving ideas. Anyway, World of Warcraft. God forbid! This happens because, as I said, the devil offers them a world that satisfies their desires, an offer that is very hard, if not impossible, to refuse, especially in cases where young people are in unloving households, that is, arguments at home, indifference, ignorance due to career, money, and other more sinful reasons. For example, there is a completely satanic horror game whose last episode came out a few months ago, in which, supposedly, you destroy the evil one, the devil, but it is filled with unimaginable violence and occultism – a game that brought the producing company $110 million – if I remember correctly, an amount like that – in two months, brethren. And those who play are truly scarred in the worst way by this game and are literally fleeced of money while playing. They admit it themselves, I know it from them. Just imagine! And on top of that, the game also has coding errors through it, the sound doesn’t work and so on. Well, isn’t that demonic influence here, brothers?

Horror, satanic games are terrible, brothers! Do you understand? Young people shut themselves in their own world. They have huge worlds in games that totally disconnect them from reality; even in Asian countries there is a phenomenon where young people threaten suicide if their parents take them out of the room before they finish a game which – I don’t know if you know – lasts for months and possibly even years. Essentially, elderly parents support their kids because these games, with many players, are in some immense virtual worlds and they take years.

In the case of other computer games, I know of instances where high school students have threatened their parents with violence or suicide if their game is taken away. And here I have in mind types of games that are not as aggressive, for example, FIFA, football. And this guy was about to beat his mother. God forbid! Whereas, on the other hand, there are FPS games – meaning First Person Shooter games, where you don’t see yourself, but you are actually in that world and you only see the gun, the rifle. God forbid! I know of a case where a child shot his parents because they took his game away. The mother died, and the father ended up in the hospital, in emergency care. Do you understand? Everyone said, including the father, that the 16-year-old, or however old he was, did not know what he was doing, believing that his parents would reset to life like the characters in the game.

The RPGs are popular today, similar to the FPSs. RPG – Role Playing Game – in which you play the role of a brutal superhero with magical, occult powers, and not a humble, gentle one. Obviously, in RPGs, you likewise destroy and kill for a final purpose that is supposedly good – of a very questionable pseudo-kindness (you are even destroying planets). Of course these are promoted as Fantasy or Science Fiction. It’s not so, brothers! It is satanism. The devil’s new world is not a neutral fantasy. Another case I remember now is of a young man who was in a car with his father, and when they stopped at a red traffic light and an elderly woman walked in front of them, the child began to shout: “Run her over! Run her over! We’ll score points!” He could no longer distinguish between real and imaginary.

Speaking of cars, due to a car game, in a large city in Romania, some young people who were addicted to the adrenaline of the game got into a car on a straight boulevard in that city and stepped on the accelerator all the way down, as long as the engine lasted. Of course, at the first turn, they could no longer control the car, and it crashed into a tree, splitting in two, lengthwise, brothers. Obviously, they all died. This happened many years ago, and the game is relatively old – it’s called Need for Speed. Let alone today when we have car games with much more realistic graphics and VR headsets – virtual reality – in which you are totally immersed in that game… God forbid!

Also, speaking of FPS games, I remember someone who cried during confession because he was imitating – he kept his hand in front of him continuously – the way he’s holding the gun in the game. And he couldn’t get rid of this reflex wherever he was. Imagine at home, at lunch, at school with friends – he was constantly making gestures like that [pointing and drawing a gun]. God forbid, brethren!

You might say these are extreme cases, but they are not isolated. The most common are violence at home, insolence at school, in everyday life, including fights, rudeness, disinterest in everything, lack of respect, including lack of personal hygiene, not to mention lack of interest for one’s own future and not to mention the help, attention and respect that should be given to others, including parents. Due to the pleasure of the false world in which a person is immersed, he forgets about everything: about virtue, love, being human. They keep looking at the screen. There are millions of gamers and millions of subscribers to YouTube channels where some play all day, doing nothing else. Brothers, at best you are wasting your time, if not your mind also, with this strong type of drug. Because it’s a type of drug. And watch this year and the years to come as games become even more attractive; and I say this not only because of the realism due to the dizzying speed of progress in graphic subsystems, namely GPUs and boards to be as high-performing as possible, but especially because of the artificial intelligence engines that are becoming increasingly well-trained to keep people enslaved in their world, in the very serious and passionate world of games.

This is the great danger in the future: the world of artificial intelligence linked to virtual reality, which can be very demonic, brethren. I hope it won’t be, but I’m very much afraid that it will. It could be a weapon more powerful than the nuclear bomb, a weapon that could wipe out civilization, push it into a regression whose catastrophic first steps we are already witnessing. Folks, come into real life a little bit and let’s not be so dependent on adrenaline and dopamine, let’s not be so drugged, and then we will discover the beauty of gentleness, the beauty of virtue!

We will discover how beautiful those around us are, and how good it is to pray, to read, to go to church, and all the other things, even if at first it may seem boring. It’s not, brethren. People are much more complex and can love much more than screens. Screens do not love. In the devil’s world, there is no love. Just a simulacrum, at most. Brethren, our freedom is at stake, our eternal future. Let’s not lose them, and you must know that only Christ can help us here because this is, I reckon, the greatest temptation of mankind: we are offered the whole world in order to worship sin. Today, I believe that one of the main forms in which the so-called “whole world” is offered to each of us is through computer games and virtual reality. Brethren, this is not to be trifled with.

Thank you for staying with me in reality until now. Let us not forget to love! God help us! Through the prayers of our Holy Fathers, Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on us! Amen.

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