From the spirit of fornication, Jesus, deliver us.
Fornication is not a word people use very often these days, mostly perhaps because they do not care to acknowledge the sinfulness of the act. Specifically, fornication means sexual activity outside marriage between people who are not married (sexual activity outside marriage between people who are married is adultery).
The spirit of fornication, however, implies something broader, particularly the impurity that leads to acts of fornication. It is a disorder in us, something that turns our desires upside down and inside out, something that tugs at us, drawing us away from God and from the moral law He has so perfectly set for us. The spirit of fornication nudges us to think that lust is not so bad or that just a little peek or a little off-color joke will not hurt anything. But what we are really doing is looking at other human beings not as God’s children endowed with human dignity but as objects for our own use.
This is why we must pray that Jesus deliver us from the spirit of fornication, for it is a threat to the love that our Lord commands us to have for each other and for God.
From everlasting death, Jesus, deliver us.
Everlasting death is the consequence of living in grave sin and refusing to repent right up to the end. It is essentially choosing one’s disordered will, one’s serious sins over God’s perfect will and over His love. God has given us free will because without that gift we cannot truly love, but free will comes with a risk because we can turn our backs on God and become slaves to sin. We can choose everlasting death, separation from God for all eternity. And there is no greater horror than that.
From the neglect of Thine inspirations, Jesus, deliver us.
Jesus is always guiding us, always inspiring us, always nudging us (sometimes rather vigorously) toward the right path, which leads straight to Him. But are we listening? Are we responding? Or are we like St. Augustine who once prayed that God heal him of his sinful ways...but not quite yet?
We neglect or turn away from Jesus’ inspirations only to our detriment. We must learn how to hear our Lord, through Scripture, through the sacraments, in prayer, in the words and actions of other people. Then we have to set aside our own preferences and follow His ways, confident that what He wants is a lot better for us than our whims and even our plans.
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