I recently finished Anne Rice's Of Love and Evil, the second novel in the Songs of the Seraphim series. Toby O'Dare, a hit man who has known profound grief, is visited by Malchiah, an seraph who bears a message of God's mercy and the need to make reparation for sin. Thus far, that opportunity has involved travelling back in time and space ("Angel Time") to protect God's chosen people, the Jews, from persecution. In the first novel in the series, Angel Time, Malchiah brings Toby to thirteenth century England where, in the guise of a Dominican friar, he defends a Jewish family that has been falsely accused of murdering their young daughter. Similarly, in this second novel, Toby is taken to sixteenth century Rome, where he intervenes in the case of a Jewish physician, who has been falsely accused of poisoning his Christian patient. It is a delightful series, well-grounded in the Catholic theological tradition with much owed to Thomas Aquinas, the "Angelic Doctor", that creatively explores the rapport between angels and humans. One hopes that Ms. Rice's recent defection from the Church (which is a topic for another post) will not adversely impact the series.
Here a just a few things that I love about the series:
It recognizes angels as the personal representatives of God's love and protection. In other words, God could--and often does--protect and guide us humans directly, but His love is such that He creates spiritual beings for the sole purpose of bearing His love to us.
It acknowledges the reality of spiritual warfare. If there are spiritual beings who have chosen from the moment of their creation to love and serve God and to collaborate in our salvation, then there must also be spiritual beings who have chosen to not love and serve God and who work toward our destruction.
It has an historical perspective. There can be no doubt that Ms. Rice is an enthusiastic student of Ancient, Medieval and Renaissance history. I am particularly appreciative of the fact that Rice has chosen neither to defame the Church (in a Dan Brown-esque way) nor to ignore her very real faults and failures through the centuries. Especially heartbreaking is the mistreatment of the Jews in Medieval and Renaissance Europe.
On a final note, I thought that a quotation prefacing the book reflects well the overarching theme of the series:
"We are each of us angels with only one wing; and we can only fly by embracing one another."
--Luciano de Crescenzo
Night Prayer (Compline) for Tuesdays contains a rather alarming passage from 1 Peter:
Stay sober and alert. Your opponent the devil is prowling like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. Resist him, solid in your faith. (5:8, 9)
Not the most comforting bedtime reading, that. It is, however, well worth reflection.
Intriguingly, Pope John Paul II read this precise passage the night before his assassination attempt. Many theories later developed (during the legal proceedings) in an effort to explain who was ultimately responsible and why: Did Mehmet Ali Agca, the Pope's would-be assassin, act alone, on his own motives, or as a Soviet agent? The Pope, it has been reported, was surprisingly uninterested in such speculation, simply saying, "I know well that the responsible one was the devil."
Again and again the sacred authors warn us of our spiritual enemies. For the first century Christians, these spiritual enemies were as much a reality as were their temporal enemies--perhaps more so. John warns the early Christians, then suffering under the persecution of Emperor Domitian, "woe to you, earth and sea, for the Devil has come down to you in great fury, for he knows he has but a short time" (Revelation 12:12).
The fact is that Satan, whom our Lord calls "a murderer from the beginning" and "a liar" (John 8:44), is real. He is determined to destroy us, to separate us from the love of Christ and join him in that eternal separation that we call Hell (Revelation 12:13-17). His activity is as varied and extensive as human activity, such is his hatred and envy for us; he would, were he permitted, completely derail the entire Christian mission. A spiritual problem, therefore, calls for a spiritual solution.
Before his ascension, Christ told his disciples, "These signs will accompany those who believe: in my name they will drive out demons, they will speak new languages... they will lay hands on the sick and they will recover" (Mark 16:17, 18). These signs correspond to the various spiritual gifts (Greek charismata) that the Holy Spirit often bestowed upon the early Christians (Acts 2:4, 1 Corinthians 12:7-10). In other words, Christ does not leave us defenseless, but gives us His own Spirit to protect us against spiritual attack. What's more, He gives us the protection of Saint Michael and the other angels (Acts 12:6-10, Revelation 12:7-9).
But how often do we invoke the help of our spiritual allies? How often do we, in effect, say, "No thank you Lord... I don't need help... I can handle this"? How many plans have come to ruin through such obstinate self-reliance? How many hearts have been broken, how many hopes crushed and how many faiths destroyed? My brothers and sisters, it is time to WAKE UP! It is time to face the hard fact that we were all born on a battlefield. War rages around us, whether seen or unseen, and we cannot afford to be drunk on "feel good" spirituality.
James instructs us to "resist the devil and he will flee from you" (4:7). Our Lord has given us His own Spirit, along with all the angels in Heaven, for our spiritual defense. What further weapons do we need? As it is written, "If the Lord is for us, who can be against us?" (Romans 8:31).
The prayer in this video (Pope Leo XIII's Prayer to Saint Michael) was recited after every Low Mass from 1888 to 1964.
