ACC ~ Mark 1 v13

SUGGESTION, DELIGHT, CONSENT

GREGORY THE GREAT: Temptation is brought to fulfillment by three stages: suggestion, delight, consent. And we in temptation generally fall through delight, and then through consent; for being begotten of the sin of the flesh we bear within us that through which we suffer conflict. But God, incarnate in the womb of a virgin, came into the world without sin, and so suffers no conflict within himself. He could therefore be tempted by suggestion, but the delight of sin could never touch his mind. So all these temptations of the devil were from without, not from within Him. ON THE GOSPEL OF THE SUNDAY SERMON 16. [1]

[1] Cetedec 1711, 1.16.1.23; SSGF 2:3.

THE SUCCESSION OF TEMPTATIONS

BEDE: Soon after he had been baptized, he performed a fast of forty days by himself, [1] and he taught and informed us by his example that, after we have received forgiveness of sins in baptism, we should devote ourselves to vigils, fasts, prayers and other spiritually fruitful things, lest when we are sluggish and less vigilant the unclean spirit expelled from our heart by baptism may return, and finding us fruitless in spiritual riches, weigh us down again with a sevenfold pestilence, and our last state would then be worse than the first. [2] Let us be wary that we do not relight the fires of old obsessions which would wreck us on our new voyage. Whatever sort of flaming sword it is that guards the doorway of paradise has been already effectively extinguished for each of the faithful in the font of baptism. For the unfaithful, however, the gate remains always formidable, and also for those falsely called faithful though they have not been chosen, since they have no fear of entangling themselves in sins after baptism. It is as though the same fire put out in baptism has been rekindled after it had been once extinguished. HOMILIES ON THE GOSPELS 1.12. [3]

[1] Mt 4:2; Mk 1:13; Lk 4:2.

[2] Mt 12:43-45; Lk 11:24-26.

[3] Cetedoc 1367, 1.12.174; HOG 1:119-20**.