St Paul gives us a principle that reaches into almost every area of the spiritual life: "All things are lawful for me, but not all things are beneficial. All things are lawful for me, but I will not be dominated by anything" (1 Corinthians 6:12). There are many things in this world that may be lawful for us to use or enjoy, but we should still be able to say, "I will not allow this thing to control me." I will not be a slave to food, drink, money, technology, another person or any other created thing. Once something begins to control us negatively and affect our life negatively, it has already become a kind of bondage.
This is why addictions and afflictions are not limited to the two things people usually mention first, drinking and smoking. Anything can become an addiction if it controls us. Some things may not be addictions in the strict sense of the word, but an evil habit can still become so strong that we find it difficult to overcome. Even after repentance and Confession, people sometimes complain that they repeat the same mistakes again and again because the behaviour has become habitual. So the question is not merely whether something is permitted. We also have to ask whether we are still free in relation to it.
I am not trying to give a systematic list of every possible addiction. Each one of us knows something about the areas in which we become weak. What I want to do is place a few ordinary habits beside St Paul's words and ask a simple question: am I controlling this thing, or is this thing controlling me?
When a Habit Begins to Rule Us
I have a strict conviction about alcohol. In my opinion, and from what I have learnt from Scripture, drinking is not Christian. I do not make a distinction between moderate drinking and excessive drinking. For me, it is the same because drinking does not contribute to the spiritual life. Hosea says that wine takes away understanding (Hosea 4:11), and St Paul says, "Do not get drunk with wine... but be filled with the Spirit" (Ephesians 5:18). Drinking weakens understanding, prudence and self-control, and when those are weakened we become more vulnerable to sins and mistakes.
People sometimes say, "Father, I do not cause trouble. I only take a little every evening. I do not shout or become a nuisance." But if you need that drink every evening, ask whether it has already begun to dominate you. My question is very practical: when do you pray better, before the drink or after it? Judge objectively. If it weakens your prayer, weakens your understanding or becomes something you feel you must have, get out of it. Surrender that part of your life to the Lord rather than keeping one area back from Him.
At parties there is sometimes an invitation that says, "Bring your own wine and spirits." I joke that the Christian should bring his own Spirit too, but it should be the Holy Spirit. In Catholic homes I have sometimes seen two "altars." On one side there is St Joseph, Mother Mary, St Anthony, the Rosary and holy water. Close by there is another collection of "spirits" in bottles. Some of them even carry saintly names such as Old Monk or St Agnes, as though that made the second altar more devout. One altar is for the Lord and the other is for Satan. To me that is a counter-witness. If you want spiritual perfection and you want your house to be a house of prayer, do not hold back that part of your life from the Lord.
The same seriousness applies to smoking. In my experience, smoking is an addiction and a sin. Every cigarette packet warns that it is injurious to health and, I would add, to the pocket as well. When a person knowingly continues taking into the body something that destroys health, I describe that as another act of committing suicide because the person is destroying life. The same principle applies to drinking. We should not pretend that a habit is harmless simply because it has become common.
I once went to bless a home after a woman had attempted suicide there and later died from her injuries. Her family told me that while she was dying in hospital, they pleaded with her to call upon Jesus. She had been a chain smoker, and instead she asked for a cigarette. I never forgot that story. Even at such a terrible moment, the habit spoke loudly. Something repeated for years had entered so deeply into her life that the craving stood in the place where her family was begging her to turn to Jesus.
That is the danger of a bad habit. It can weaken our freedom to choose what is good and even compete with our choice for God. Death is the moment when we finally place ourselves into God's hands, and we should not allow habits to become so powerful that they fight us even then. Smoking is diabolical when it enslaves a person in this way. A person can become controlled to some extent by the spirits of this world instead of living in the freedom of the Holy Spirit. By all means, get out of habits that are beginning to claim that kind of power over you.
The Quiet Addictions of Ordinary Life
Some forms of bondage are obvious, but others are easily accepted because they look ordinary. Shopping can become one of them. In Perth, a woman once gave testimony after attending prayer sessions and said that one of the healings she had received was freedom from an addiction to shopping. She was not talking about buying what the family needed. She meant the compulsion to buy simply because it was the weekend, because money was available or because something attractive was in front of her.
We can buy clothes again and again and then hardly use them. Some clothes are taking "eternal rest in the cupboards." Money is spent, possessions accumulate, credit cards are used, burdens are brought into the family, and the desire of the eyes simply keeps asking for more. Think also about those who do not have enough clothing to protect themselves from the cold. Judge honestly whether you are buying because there is a real need or because buying itself has become a habit. Excessive shopping beyond our needs is something we have to control, and when it becomes greed and compulsion it is sin.
Food can become the same kind of master. Philippians speaks about people whose "god is the belly" (Philippians 3:19). There are many belly worshippers in the world, people who live to please the appetite. We do not always eat because we are hungry. Sometimes we eat because desire itself demands satisfaction. Food is a gift from God, but gluttony turns a gift into a master.
Isaiah describes a people whom God called to weeping, mourning and fasting, but instead there was feasting, eating meat and drinking wine, with the cry, "Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die" (Isaiah 22:13). That old philosophy is still with us. Eat, drink, make merry and live for pleasure because tomorrow we die. But that cannot be the lifestyle of the children of God. As prudent disciples of Jesus, we have to judge what is beneficial rather than merely following what everyone around us does.
Do not answer by saying, "This is Australia." Australia is not the Promised Land, and each country does not have its own Catholic morality. Catholic means universal. The faith is the same in India, Australia, the United States, Britain and everywhere else. Nobody receives a privilege to commit sin because of the country in which he or she happens to live. We still have to judge eating, drinking, partying and every other activity by whether it helps or harms our life with God.
Even sleep can become a habit that controls us. When Fr Michael and I visited a zoo in Perth, the keeper told us that a koala can sleep around twenty hours a day. I joked that some people are just like koalas. I also remember visiting an older woman who lived alone and told me that she slept until about two in the afternoon, had breakfast, and before long it was evening and time to sleep again.
There could be many reasons that push a person into such a pattern, including depression, loneliness or boredom. But the habit itself still has to be examined. Sleep can become a bad habit that does not help our spiritual journey. You may need eight hours. A child may need more. Sickness may require more rest. But do not spend all your spare time sleeping and then pretend that the habit has no power over you.
Gambling is another area where a habit can destroy a family. Men gamble, women gamble, and sometimes both husband and wife gamble. Who suffers? Very often the children suffer. Money is repeatedly spent on lottery tickets or gambling while family responsibilities are neglected. Gambling is a sin, and when it becomes habitual it can control money, attention and relationships until the whole family carries the consequences.
The media we use also deserve serious examination. Mobile phones, computers, social networks, games and television can become instruments through which the devil disturbs family relationships when they are allowed to create secrecy, distraction and unholy relationships. A phone can give a person the privacy to enter into relationships that would never be carried on openly. Many illicit relationships begin with conversations that seem small.
Here is a simple principle: if a relationship or conversation has to be kept habitually secret from your husband or wife, you are not meant to be in it. If the phone rings and you have to run to another room every time because your spouse must never hear the conversation, something is wrong. We can invent wonderful explanations. Perhaps it is your father's friend's friend, or your mother-in-law's mother-in-law calling from heaven. But if habitual secrecy surrounds the relationship, judge what is really happening.
Of course there are legitimate business matters or particular conversations that require privacy. I am not speaking about an occasional private matter. I am speaking about the repeated pattern in which calls, messages and relationships must be hidden from the family every day. Even "counselling" can become an excuse. Who are you to counsel everybody in the world? A good spiritual life does not automatically authorise a married person to build private emotional relationships under the name of counselling. Let family relationships be transparent.
The same discipline applies to computers, Facebook, games and television. We can spend hour after hour looking at profiles, building more and more connections, playing games or moving from one channel to another without any real purpose. I keep asking, why do we need so many friends? We are limited people. Sometimes we cannot even handle the relationships inside our own families well, yet we keep building more and more connections. I feel that when these networks are used imprudently, they can bring more evil than good into relationships and families.
I also cannot ignore pornography when speaking about addictions. The devil has succeeded in drawing a vast number of people into the habit of watching pornography. Pornography is as serious as the sin of adultery. You are not supposed to watch another person's nakedness, and when you do so through pornography you violate the Sixth Commandment. It can terribly affect husband-wife relationships whether one spouse or both are involved. There should be deliverance from pornography. Pray for deliverance and take real steps to get out of the habit.
Train for the Crown That Does Not Perish
Why should we exercise this kind of self-control? St Paul gives the reason by comparing the spiritual life with an athlete training for a race: "Athletes exercise self-control in all things. They do it to receive a perishable wreath, but we an imperishable one" (1 Corinthians 9:25). The athlete controls many things because there is a goal, and St Paul brings the comparison back to us. We are looking for an imperishable crown. We have a destination to reach.
Paul goes even further and says, "I punish my body and enslave it, so that after proclaiming to others, I myself should not be disqualified" (1 Corinthians 9:27). He does not allow the body to control him. He controls the body. That challenges me because Paul is a preacher of the Word, yet he does not say, "Because I preach, I am safe." After proclaiming morality to others, he still knows that he himself needs discipline.
We have a race to finish and a crown of glory with Jesus before us. Self-control is not useless. It is exercised for a purpose. If bad habits distract us and carry us away, we can become tired on the journey or even be disqualified in the race. We train the body and the will so that the things of this world do not drag us away from our destination, which is eternal glory with Jesus.
So make the principle personal: "I will not allow anything to control me." I am not a slave of things, and I should not become a slave even of persons. Some people are not addicted to objects but become so attached to another person that they lose freedom there as well. Created things and created persons must never take the place that belongs to God.
Counter the Habit Before It Becomes Your Character
There is also a very practical way of looking at habits. I once read a saying: "You sow an act and you reap a habit. You sow a habit and you reap a character." A habit normally begins with an act that is repeated. A habit that is pampered and never challenged can eventually become so deeply embedded that it feels like part of our character. The first cigarette a friend gives you can become the starting point of years of smoking. A first introduction to a sexual perversion can also become the seed from which a destructive habit grows. Habits come through repetition of particular acts.
If repetition forms the habit, then we have to counteract the habit by doing the opposite. A person who feels compelled to answer every phone call can decide not to answer a few calls immediately. Someone who spends every spare moment on a computer can decide on a period when the computer will not be used except for necessary work. If there is no emergency, a person may decide not to check email for a period. Someone who automatically turns on the television can decide, "Today, no television in my house." These are deliberate acts of control.
We have to judge these things sensibly. Work, family responsibilities and emergencies are real. The point is not to make artificial rules and boast about them. The point is to exercise limits and control. When you persist in doing the opposite of a bad habit, you begin to experience deliverance. You teach the will that an urge does not have to be obeyed.
Each one of us knows something about the habits that have to be faced. I cannot give a complete list, and there is no need. Judge for yourself. Ask what you find difficult to leave aside, what repeatedly distracts you from prayer, what harms your family, what wastes your time, what you hide, or what you keep defending because you do not want to surrender it. Then place that area before the Lord and make a real decision to come out of it.
I should stop here, otherwise it may become a habit in me to go on preaching. But the final point is serious. If our family is afflicted by or addicted to anything, we should ask the Lord for deliverance, renounce the slavery and make a decision to come out of it. We should dedicate ourselves entirely to His Kingdom and to a disciplined spiritual life.
So take St Paul's words with you: "I will not be dominated by anything." Let us control the things that threaten to control us because we have a destination to reach. Lord, have mercy on us. Help us come out of every slavery and from the yoke of the devil. If our family is afflicted by or addicted to anything, we renounce it in Jesus' name. Help us dedicate ourselves entirely to Your Kingdom and to a disciplined spiritual life, so that we may remain free to choose Jesus and receive the crown that does not perish.