The answer
St. Evagrius Ponticus says, “If you have not yet received the grace of prayer or of psalmody, the press ahead eagerly. You will gain hold of it … Do not fall into despondency if at times you do not get what you ask for. Keep up your courage. It will come later.”103
“Know that the holy angels urge us in to pray. They are present with us amid rejoicing as they pray for us. So if we are careless and admit distracting thoughts we provoke them sharply inasmuch as they are joining in the fight on our behalf. On the contrary by this contempt of their services and by this forsaking of their God and Ruler we fall in with the designs of the impure demons.”104
“By true prayer a monk becomes another angel, for he ardently longs to see the face of the Father in heaven.”105
Fr. Tadros Yacoub Malaty
Notes
103 St. Evagrius of Pontus, Evagrius Ponticus: The Praktikos. Chapters on Prayer, trans., John Eudes Bamberger (Cistercian Publications, 1972) 87–88: p. 69–70.
104 St. Evagrius of Pontus, Evagrius Ponticus: The Praktikos. Chapters on Prayer, trans., John Eudes Bamberger (Cistercian Publications, 1972) 81: p. 68–69.
105 St. Evagrius of Pontus, Evagrius Ponticus: The Praktikos. Chapters on Prayer, trans., John Eudes Bamberger (Cistercian Publications, 1972) 113: p. 74.