The Antichrist

There was a time in my life when I would shy away from talking about or reading anything that had to do with the existence of evil. I think I was afraid. I didn’t want to think about anything evil because I thought it would gain more power over me and over the world. I have since learned that knowing our enemy is a very important part of being able to defeat evil in our lives. If we avoid or dismiss evil and sin, it will remain. Only when we bring it to the light is it rendered powerless. The light of Christ dispels all darkness. It is through the light of the Resurrection that redemption comes to the world.

This past week the daily readings of the Church have been from the first letter of John. In this letter St John writes about the antichrist, which he describes as an ideology rather than a person. As we witness our country in upheaval, divided, full of pride and judgment on both sides, it’s no surprise people have been talking about the end times and the antichrist. This topic is always highly susceptible to misinterpretation, so it is good for us to know what the bible actually says about the antichrist. For our purposes here, we will mainly stick to the first letter of St John.

Children, it is the last hour! As you have heard that antichrist is coming, so now many antichrists have come. From this we know that it is the last hour. They went out from us, but they did not belong to us; for if they had belonged to us, they would have remained with us. But by going out they made it plain that none of them belongs to us. But you have been anointed by the Holy One, and all of you have knowledge. I write to you, not because you do not know the truth, but because you know it, and you know that no lie comes from the truth. Who is the liar but the one who denies that Jesus is the Christ? This is the antichrist, the one who denies the Father and the Son. 

1 John 2:18-21

In this passage, St John describes the antichrist as a movement based upon false teachings, which is leading people away from the central Truth of Jesus Christ and the teaching of the Apostles. He makes it clear that the antichrist does not belong to Christ and he describes this movement as a lie. It helps us today to know that even early on in Church history the ideology of the antichrist was already present in the world, existing in opposition to Christ; thus the antichrist has existed in all times.

By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God. And this is the spirit of the antichrist, of which you have heard that it is coming; and now it is already in the world… They are from the world; therefore what they say is from the world, and the world listens to them. We are from God. Whoever knows God listens to us, and whoever is not from God does not listen to us. From this we know the spirit of truth and the spirit of error.

1 John 4:2-6

In this passage, St John furthers our understanding of the antichrist. He explains how the world listens to the antichrist because the antichrist is of the world and not of God. With this, we must always keep in mind that what the world does and says is not always going to align with Jesus. In a lot of cases, it will actually be opposed to Jesus and will be a lie that we are told in order to lead us astray. As Christians we must always be grounded in the Truth of Christ through the Holy Spirit. We must always oppose the antichrist that remains in the world so that we will not be conformed to the world. St Paul writes about this in his letter to the Romans when he says:

Do not be conformed to this world but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that you may prove what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.

Romans 12:2

The renewal of our minds happens through the power of the Holy Spirit. When we allow the Holy Spirit access, we will experience a transformation. We will be renewed. The same Spirit that rose Jesus from the dead lives in us today! Are we willing to be transformed by the power of God? It is up to us to desire this renewal. It is up to us to choose to live differently that the world is telling us to live. To be counter-cultural is to not allow the antichrist to shape us. It is to separate ourselves from the wiles of the world that are leading us into sin, into error, into falsities and lies, into hatred, into consumerism and selfishness, and all of the other things that distract us from Jesus.

These passages from St John’s letter shed some light on what we are seeing today in our current culture. Although our world seems to be so far away from Jesus, I dare say that parallels to the antichrist have been seen in all cultures throughout all of history. This is why we are called to always be ready. To prepare our hearts for the final day, whether that be our final day on earth at our death, or the final day of all the earth when Christ returns. Both require preparation and both require us to be ready at any moment. We cannot presume to think we will not taste death, nor that we will not be judged by God who is the just judge.

As I sit here today and watch the deterioration of our society, I am realizing that this has been the direction we have been headed for quite some time. This is not something that should come as a shocker to us by any means. But there are times when we need to engage in battle and times when we need to retreat. I believe for the majority of us, who are all sitting at home and are unable to really do anything about all that is happening in the world, other than pray of course, we need to spend this time regaining our strength. We need to gaze upon the Holy Face of Jesus and draw close to our mother Mary.

This battle is far from over, but to engage on social media as a means of trying to fix things or to argue a side is only leading us astray. To spend our days focused only on the vast array of information out there for us to consume is not living. We are forgetting the very people right in front of us as a result of being so distracted by things that we cannot control.

Instead, I propose that we love those right in front of us. That we live our lives today, instead of waiting for what will happen tomorrow. That we step out in faith, even though our life is not on steady ground right now. We cannot let ourselves be chained to what others are doing and saying. True freedom is not allowing the actions and words of others to rule over our emotions or steal our hope. Other people do not have that kind of dominion over us, unless we allow them to.

This is such a struggle, but remember that you were made for these times. The Lord is calling you to something bigger, while the enemy is trying to get us all to give into despair. Seek God. Seek him even in the confusion and the hurt. Give him your heart. Talk to him honestly about all the things that you are struggling with right now. Let him hold you in his arms. He is your Father. He wants you to run to him and crawl up into his lap right now.

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