QUOTATION: Satan

Satan is equally pleased by our overestimating him and our underestimating him.

--Peter Kreeft

QUOTATION: Satan's Use of Virtue

One of Satan’s tactics is to take one virtue and isolate it from others. Beware of these subtle tactics of Satan, who disguises himself well in the robes of virtue. He uses detached virtues, virtues out of balance and proportion.

--Msgr. Charles Pope, “Beware the Sins of the Pious – A Reflection on the Ways Satan Uses Even Good Things to Entrap Us”, Community in Mission Blog, Aug. 8, 2017

QUOTATION: Unbelief

If we don’t believe in the devil, sooner or later we won’t believe in God.

--Archbishop Charles J. Chaput

QUOTATION: Fighting Sin

You don't dispel Satan using Satan's ways.

-- Padre Pio

QUOTATION: Satan's Temptation of Christ

The first temptation of Satan on the Mount was to try to induce Our Lord to give up the salvation of souls and to concentrate upon social salvation by turning stones into bread—on the false assumption that it was hungry stomachs and not corrupted hearts that made an unhappy civilization.

--Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen, Peace of Soul, 1949

QUOTATION: False Conscience

The devil, our cruel enemy, takes pleasure in aiding us to form false conscience and in troubling our peace of soul; he sometimes succeeds in making us believe that there is sin in everything, in order that, thus deluded, we may deprive ourselves of the happiness of participating in the Eucharistic Banquet, and so lose the precious graces which Our Lord distributes to souls that receive Him worthily. Take care not to become the sport of the spirit of darkness.

--St. Mary Euphrasia Pelletier, Conferences and Instructions

QUOTATION: Small Sins

The devil belittles small sins; otherwise he cannot lead us into greater ones.

--St. Mark the Ascetic

QUOTATION: Anxiety

By the anxieties and worries of this life Satan tries to dull man's heart and make a dwelling for himself there.

--St. Francis of Assisi

QUOTATION: Temptation

The devil only tempts those souls that wish to abandon sin and those that are in a state of grace. The others belong to him; he has no need to tempt them.

St. Jean Vianney, the Curé of Ars

QUOTATION: Pride

The devil laughs. He is perfectly content to see you becoming chaste and brave and self-controlled provided, all the time, he is setting up in you the Dictatorship of Pride - just as he would be quite content to see your chilblains cured if he was allowed, in return, to give you cancer.

--C. S. Lewis, Mere Christianity

QUOTATION: Falls from Grace

My beloved, may every fall, even if it is serious and habitual sin, always become for us a small step toward a higher degree of perfection.

In fact, the only reason why the Immaculate permits us to fall is to cure us from our self-conceit, from our pride, to make us humble and thus make us docile to the divine graces.

The devil, instead, tries to inject in us discouragement and internal depression in those circumstances, which is, in fact, nothing else than our pride surfacing again.

--St. Maximillian Kolbe

QUOTATION: In the End There Are Only Two Destinies

There are 10,000 times 10,000 roads down which you may travel during life. But at the end of all of these roads, you will see one or the other of two faces: the merciful face of Christ or the miserable face of Satan.

--Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen, Treasured Love Story

QUOTATION: Satan's Tricks

Before the sin, Satan assures us that it is of no consequence; after the sin, he persuades us that it is unforgivable.

--Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen

QUOTATION: A Ruse of the Devil

It is a ruse of the devil, by which he deceives good people, to induce them to do more than they are able, so that they end up not being able to do anything. The spirit of God urges one gently to do the good that can be done reasonably, so that it may be done perseveringly and for a long time. 

--St. Vincent de Paul

QUOTATION: Satan

Satan never gains so many cohorts as when, in his shrewdness, he spreads the rumor that he is long since dead

--Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen

QUOTATION: How Satan Gets Christians to Deny Christ

In former times, Christians were incited to renounce Christ; now they are taught to deny Christ. Then they were forced, now they are taught; then violence was used, now it is deception; then one heard the shouts of the Enemy; now, when he prowls around, gentle and insinuating, it is difficult to recognize him. Everyone knows how he tried to force Christians to deny Christ: he tried to attract them to himself so that they would renounce him; but they confessed Christ and were crowned by him. Now they are taught to deny Christ by trickery, because he doesn’t want them to realize that he is drawing them away from Christ.

--St. Augustine, Commentaries on the Psalms, 39:1

QUOTATION: Satan's Torment

When the enemy cannot succeed in making you sin, and has lost the hope of attaining this end, he strives at least to torment you.

--St. Ignatius Loyola, Letters, 4.

QUOTATION: How Satan Operates

Before attacking a man, Satan seeks the weakest or least guarded point; then erects his battery, that he may carry his assault.

--St. Ignatius Loyola

QUOTATION: The Three Enemies of Man

Three enemies of man: Death, which overtakes him by surprise; Time, which keeps slipping by; the Devil, who seeks to ensnare him.

--St. John Bosco

QUOTATION: Fighting Evil

We must not believe the Evil One when he tells us that there is nothing we can do in the face of violence, injustice and sin.

--Pope Francis