The Passions

How do prayer and fasting help against lust?

Prayer and fasting are the spiritual disciplines that bring the grace of the Holy Spirit, and he insists every day of the struggle must begin and end with prayer. His analogy is a failing bench press: when the bar gets too heavy, the man cries out for the Holy Spirit to grab the bar and lift it with him, because the battle is beyond his own strength — a single sober day, he says, is a miracle that happens through the power of the Holy Spirit. The regimen must be absolutely consistent; praying an hour and then skipping two days does not work.