“Self-control, according to the spiritual tradition of the Church, is the spiritual mastery over the lusts of the mind and the flesh. It is often called “passionlessness” by the spiritual masters. Passionlessness (apatheia) does not mean the destruction of the natural drives and desires of the body and soul, such as the need for sleep, food and drink; or the emotions such as spiritual desire, zeal, excitement, joy, awe, sorrow or fear. It means rather the control of the feelings that are normal, natural and healthy, and the mortification of the feelings that are wicked and evil.” (Father Thomas Hopko)
“…“higher virtues” may be experienced…to experience these virtues is to have reached a certain level of “dispassion” which, of course, has nothing to do with indifference or impassivity. (Often apatheia is translated as “apathy,” and this is completely misleading)…“to have dispassion is to have the fullness of love, by which I mean the complete indwelling of God.” In other words, a successful “warfare against the passions” has its own rewards as the grace of God begins to illuminate genuine repentance. (Father Steven Kostoff, St. John Climacus)
“Our desires must be surrendered one by one until we reach what the Fathers call dispassion…Dispassion is a blessed state that enables the Christian to face even betrayal by his own family and dearest friends. Dispassion is the impregnable redoubt from which God’s love sallies forth. That love may embrace hatred and overcome it, or it may be crowned with the victor’s wreath reserved for the Church’s blessed martyrs and honored confessors. Dispassion affords that grace from God whereby “not a hair of your head shall be lost” (Luke 12:18). Once we understand that the true battle lies within us, then even if a time comes when we are abused and killed, nothing will be lost…Christ sends each of us the Holy Spirit to help us gain this passionlessness and possess our souls.” (Dynamis 12/8/2020)
“Inner serenity calls for dispassion. The Holy Spirit will be with you if your intent is to struggle against all the passions that invade your consciousness and thwart you from achieving peace of soul. The church fathers realize and write about the effort it will take to gain control of your thoughts, or better stated, to battle and conquer the demons that control you and contain you in the prison of your mind. It’s a heroic struggle, but if you feel it’s all for nothing, an impossible attempt, you are what you are and cannot change, then you are beaten already.” (Very Rev. Vladimir Berzonsky)
“Dispassion engenders love, hope in God engenders dispassion, and patience and forbearance engender hope in God; these in turn are the product of complete self-control, which itself springs from fear of God. Fear of God is the result of faith in God.” (St. Maximus the Confessor)
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