The 4 components of recovery from porn – Part 2: Spirituality

This week, we continue our 4 part series on the components of recovery from porn and sex addiction. Spirituality is our focus today. 

I often hear of people, not only priests, telling others that the answer to beating porn addiction is prayer and the sacraments. Of the four components to recovery, re-ordering our spiritual life is as big as all the other 3 combined. 

BUT, the vast majority of the time it is not enough. By saying not enough, I, in no way suggest that God is not enough. Let me refer back to a broken arm story that I told in a previous article (read it here).  In theory, I am sure you would agree that if you broke your arm, you would not resort to prayer to eliminate the pain. This does not mean that you think God can’t take away the pain, it merely recognizes that He desires to reveal the TRUE cause and heal that. As I discuss in the other article, porn is a symptom, not the problem. 

To heal our porn addiction, we need to both re-order our spiritual life AND have God help us to find the actual root cause. With that said, we must recognize how deep the suggestion to re-order one’s spiritual life actually goes and the influences that are at work to keep us from doing that. 

Consider the following Scripture passages to reaffirm why this is a spiritual battle.

1 John 5:19 “We know that we are God’s children and that the whole world lies under the power of the evil one”,

And 

Matthew 4:8-9 “Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor.  “All this I will give you,” he said, “if you will bow down and worship me.” ‘

And

2 Corinthians 4:4 ”In their case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.”

When Fighting Porn Addiction, You Also Fight Demons and the “behind the scenes” battle

Scripture shows that this world is under the power of the Devil and his demons. They are continually at work to distract us from God, feed us lies about God’s truth, and lies about ourselves. 

We know from Catholic teaching of the Theology of the Body that we are made in the image of God. Mankind is created as man and woman and as in Genesis 2:24 “the two shall become one flesh”. Man and Woman in holy matrimony are called to co-create life with God. The mechanics of this co-creation is sex. The Devil perverts this beautiful gift of a married man and woman, the gift of life, into a selfish act, where we are focused on ourselves, and seek pleasure, accepting the objectification of the other and accepting pornography as counterfeit love, thus making this sexual act, an act of death rather than life. 

To combat this perversion of truth, we must actively participate in meditation, prayer, scripture reading as well as do a daily examination of conscience to allow the Holy Spirit to show us where we got off track each and every day.

It has been said by multiple priests that specialize in demonic and diabolic forces that to influence our behaviors and beliefs that a ritual of prayer, meditation, reciting the rosary, scripture reading, and participating in the sacraments of reconciliation and the eucharist, will cause the majority of these negative spiritual influences to flee. Part of the addiction to pornography is the taking part in feeding selfish desires and accepting the counterfeit sexuality that the enemy promises, the re-order of our spiritual life is one of the mandatory steps in a successful recovery. 

Again I will say that the re-ordering of the spiritual life is part, yes PART of the recovery process. 

Taking the Steps to Start your Spiritual Battle

So how does the Road to Purity program Restoring God’s Foundation fit in?

As we have stated before, RGF is different from any other program out there. The execution of the program is twofold. Part 1 is the education of the addiction along with supplying tools for battle, and a process to dig into the roots of the behavior (Recall I said that porn is the symptom of a deeper problem?). Part 2 is the homework component where we gently guide the participant or student through a process of adapting a daily regiment of prayer, scripture reading, and meditation as well as reviewing daily the stirring of emotions, and the actions of sexual sin and the near occasion of sin. This guides the re-order of the spiritual life as well as the practice of an examination of conscience – specifically with regards to sexual behaviors. 

So check back in about a week where we will reveal to you what the third of four parts to recovery from porn is. 

If you or someone you know is battling the scourge of sexual sin, pornography or other, I invite you to try for free, our unique recovery program – Restoring God’s Foundation. 

If you would like to support the Road to Purity ministry or sponsor the cost of the program for someone, please donate today.