Why is the surrounding world considered hostile to Christians (“the prince of this world is Satan”)? What is harmful and corrupt in modern society? #

“Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world.” -1 Jn 2:15-16

The Apostle John the Theologian writes:

“Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him.”
(1 John 2:15)

And the Apostle James adds:

“Know ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God? whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God.”
(James 4:4)

What is this world (ὁ κόσμος), attachment to which the apostles so insistently warn against? Blessed Theophylact explains:

“So that you do not understand the world as the totality of heaven and earth, the apostle clarifies what the world and what is in the world are. First, by ‘world’ he means sinful people who lack the love of the Father. Secondly, by what is in the world, he means what is done according to the lust of the flesh, what, acting through the senses, provokes lust… in general, everything hostile to God.”

Thus, what is hostile or sinful is not the world itself, not the world created by God, which He admired during creation, but rather sinful communities of people who have forgotten about God and, more broadly, anything that is hostile to Him. A sinner, whose thoughts are only about this earthly life and who dreams of taking everything he can from it, does not think about eternal life or about God. His actions align with the will of the “spiritual wickedness in high places” (Ephesians 6:12). Therefore, Satan is called the prince of this world.

The world becomes hostile to Christians when it distracts them from God, tempts them toward sin, and entices them with its allure, causing them to forget their mortality and the need to prepare for eternity. Instead, the world offers “the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life” (1 John 2:16). Everything in this world is transient—it has an end, no matter how long a person lives. Eternity, however, is infinite. Therefore, anything that binds a person to the temporary at the expense of eternity, anything meant solely for bodily gratification and satisfying passions, is harmful and corrupt. This includes when people artificially turn necessary things into the main goal of life.

“Therefore take no thought, saying, What shall we eat? or, What shall we drink? or, Wherewithal shall we be clothed? (For after all these things do the Gentiles seek:) for your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all these things. But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.”
(Matthew 6:31–33)

— Priest Evgeny Gureev.