{"id":1752,"date":"2022-11-26T06:13:31","date_gmt":"2022-11-26T06:13:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/2022\/11\/26\/at-the-entrance-to-the-monastery\/"},"modified":"2022-11-26T06:13:31","modified_gmt":"2022-11-26T06:13:31","slug":"at-the-entrance-to-the-monastery","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/2022\/11\/26\/at-the-entrance-to-the-monastery\/","title":{"rendered":"At the Entrance to the Monastery"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: georgia, palatino; font-size: 14pt;\">The sign reads, &#39;Peace.&#39; It neglects to say that the desert is a place of <a href=\"https:\/\/svspress.com\/unseen-warfare\/\">unseen warfare<\/a>.&#0160;<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: georgia, palatino; font-size: 14pt;\">The desert fathers of old believed in demons because of their experiences in quest of the &quot;narrow gate&quot; that only few find. They sought to perfect themselves and so became involved as combatants in what Lorenzo Scupoli called <em>il combattimento spirituale<\/em>. They felt thwarted in their practices by opponents both malevolent and invisible. The moderns do not try to perfect themselves and so the demons leave them alone. They prefer deserts to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.merriam-webster.com\/dictionary\/fleshpot\">flesh pots<\/a>&#0160;when it comes to hunting. Those who luxuriate in the latter have already been captured.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: georgia, palatino; font-size: 14pt;\">Moderns who enter the desert for spiritual purposes need to be aware that they may get more than they bargained for.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: georgia, palatino; font-size: 14pt;\"> <a class=\"asset-img-link\" href=\"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.typepad.com\/.a\/6a010535ce1cf6970c02af1c90f5df200d-pi\"><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"MCID peace sign\" border=\"0\" class=\"asset  asset-image at-xid-6a010535ce1cf6970c02af1c90f5df200d image-full img-responsive\" src=\"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.typepad.com\/.a\/6a010535ce1cf6970c02af1c90f5df200d-800wi\" style=\"display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;\" title=\"MCID peace sign\" \/><\/a><br \/><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The sign reads, &#39;Peace.&#39; It neglects to say that the desert is a place of unseen warfare.&#0160; The desert fathers of old believed in demons because of their experiences in quest of the &quot;narrow gate&quot; that only few find. They sought to perfect themselves and so became involved as combatants in what Lorenzo Scupoli called &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/2022\/11\/26\/at-the-entrance-to-the-monastery\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;At the Entrance to the Monastery&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[358,106],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1752","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-monks-and-monasticism","category-spiritual-exercises"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1752","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1752"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1752\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1752"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1752"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1752"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}