Two great temptations...

But there are two great temptations, two great lies that await and deceive us each day:

* The temptation to change being into having.
* The temptation to change being into pretending.

That is, when we see that we are little, that we are less than what we aspire to, we feel the temptation to have, to accumulate things for ourselves: money, riches, power, culture, influences, etc.. Things that artificially supply what we lack in being.

But what is of value is not what you have, but what you are. And the anxiety of having leaves the desire of being forgotten and neglected.

The second temptation is to seek to deceive others, and trty to be what in reality we are not. It is to change being into pretending.

St. Ignatius calls "greed of riches" that first temptation of :"having". And he calls the second temptation of "pretending", "vain wordly honor".

-Florencio Segura, SJ