Dictators and brutes throughout history have somehow convinced themselves that their violence and inhumanity will secure them power. That fear and intimidation, the force of arms will win the day. And all too sadly there seem to be no end of those who are willing to be their creatures.

Today we see the willing capitulation and self-subjugation of those who so want to be in positions of supposed power and wealth, that they are willing to abase themselves, to deny reality itself if they are told to do so, to pretend to convictions they do not have and a loyalty that they do not possess.

And while they may enjoy some temporary advantage, in the end they only achieve their own undoing, as they sew the very seeds of their destruction, as hubris and arrogance, greed and selfishness is confronted and confounded by the quiet dignity and courage of those who are willing to sacrifice themselves for a better way and a better world.

As we live through these times of mendacity, extortion, venality and toxic narcissism, where it feels as if the leadership of the world has been handed over to psychopaths and gangsters, we can reflect that in the story of the temptation in the desert, all that evil could offer, can ever offer, was and is the victory of the moment, the glory of the fleeting instant, but at the price of the destruction of those who suppose themselves to be the conqueror – but are in fact the conquered.