![]() It is often called “passionlessness” by the spiritual masters. ![]() Self-control, according to the spiritual tradition of the Church, is the spiritual mastery over the lusts of the mind and the flesh. Among these we also once lived in the passions of our flesh, following the desires of the body. following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience. He is a “child of the devil” (Jn 8.44, Acts 13.10, 1 Jn 3.10) and possesses a “carnal mind” (Rom 8.7). He is bound in his mind and heart by “the lust of the flesh and the lust of the eyes and the pride of life” (1 Jn 1–17). He is the captive of sin, the willing instrument of carnal passions, the victim of all foolishness and evil. The man without self-control is enslaved. They promise them freedom, but they themselves are slaves of corruption for whatever overcomes a man, to that he is enslaved (2 Pet 2.10–19). For, uttering loud boasts of folly, they entice with licentious passions of the flesh men who have barely escaped from those who live in error. These are waterless springs and mists driven by a storm. They have eyes full of adultery, insatiable for sin. They are blots and blemishes, reveling in their dissipation. irrational animals, creatures of instinct, born to be caught and killed, reviling in matters of which they are ignorant. those who indulge in the lust of defiling passion and despise authority. Such a man has been characterized well in the second letter of Saint Peter. Man loses his self-control when he sells himself to sin and becomes a slave to the corruption of his fleshly passions. When one is perfectly free by the grace of God-“where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom” (2 Cor 3.17)-there is also perfect control over oneself. According to the saints, self-control is one of the main elements of the divine image in man, coextensive with the gift of freedom which is often explained as the essential and basic element of man’s likeness to his Creator. ![]() Self-control is one of the main characteristics of God and is one of the main gifts to man as created in God’s image. Instead they think that it can come from human effort and will power alone. This virtue is one which is not often easily attained because people forget that, like patience, it is a grace of God and they must seek it from the Lord. Self-control is also listed by the Apostle Paul as a “fruit of the Spirit” (Gal 5.22).
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