Loving Our Parents...Makes Atonement for Our Sins?

A few years back I wrote a post on our need to make "reparation" or "atonement" for the sins we commit after baptism. I shared that, although Christ's sacrifice makes atonement for the eternal debt of our sins, God our Father expects his adopted children to make amends for the temporal debt of their sins, which includes the damage we do to others as well as to our own souls. We do so, however, not under our own power, but by Christ's grace. Today, on the Feast of the Holy Family, our first reading contained some powerful statements on this subject. I'll quote from the NASB translation:

Whoever honors his father atones for sins.
and preserves himself from them....
Even if [your father's] mind fail, be considerate of him;
revile him not all the days of his life;
kindness to a father will not be forgotten,
firmly planted against the debt of your sins
— a house raised in justice to you.
(Sirach 3:3, 12-15)

It makes perfect sense. Every sin is a rejection of God's Fatherhood over us. We reject His loving, all-wise will to do our own thing. It's sin. This disfigures our soul, which is supposed to be taking on the image of His only begotten, Jesus. When we honor our parents, the earthly image of God put here by Him to guide us, we are in effect honoring God's Fatherhood over us and thus taking steps to undo the effects of our disobedience in our souls. In this way, we not only repair, or "atone," for sins; but we also "preserve" ourselves, take steps to protect ourselves, from falling into sin in the future. This honor we show to our parents is the triumph of Christ's grace within us, a manifestation of His obedience to Mary and Joseph out of obedience to the will of the Father! By Christ's power within us, we are overcoming sin and taking on the image of the Master.

The author of Sirach knew that the Lord sometimes calls us to atone for sin in this way while working against strong resistance. It can be somewhat easy to honor our parents in the normal circumstances of life, but we really have to overcome ourselves when we are called to care for a parent who fights our efforts, such as one suffering from dementia. This is when we really overcome the disfigurement sin has wrought in our souls via the grace-filled exertion it takes to remain firmly patient and kind in serving a parent. It cannot be done without Christ's grace, without Him loving our aging parents through us. We are called to become images of His own sacrificial love. Spiritually-speaking, this is about as lofty as it gets. Humanly-speaking, however, it feels horrible. It is an act of the will, made in union with Christ, the Ever-Faithful Son. [Believe me, I'm speaking to myself in this post.] The positive effects upon our souls are very real though — that is God's promise.

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Addendum: If your Old Testament is missing the Book of Sirach, then this post is for you.

EVERY Christian Believes in Purgatory

Mother Miriam reminded me of this truth. Every Christian, at least implicitly, believes in purgatory. And I would wager that if more people understood what the Catholic Church  means when it speaks of purgatory, they would find themselves compelled to also acknowledge its existence.

Too many people speak of purgatory as a "place," as they do heaven and hell.  Here is how the Catechism of the Catholic Church defines it:

All who die in God's grace and friendship, but still imperfectly purified, are indeed assured of their eternal salvation; but after death they undergo purification, so as to achieve the holiness necessary to enter the joy of heaven.

The Church gives the name Purgatory to this final purification of the elect, which is entirely different from the punishment of the damned ... The tradition of the Church, by reference to certain texts of Scripture, speaks of a cleansing fire (1 Cor.3:15, 1 Peter 1:7) ...

This teaching is also based on the practice of prayer for the dead, already mentioned in Sacred Scripture: "Therefore [Judas Maccabeus] made atonement for the dead, that they might be delivered from their sin" (2 Maccabees 12:46). From the beginning the Church has honored the memory of the dead and offered prayers in suffrage for them, above all the Eucharistic sacrifice, so that, thus purified, they may attain the beatific vision of God ... (CCC 1030-32)

Purgatory is a process, a process of cleansing.  I go into this in more depth in The God Who is Love, but let me give a few points:
 

Jesus taught, “from within, out of the heart of man, come evil thoughts, fornication, theft, murder, adultery, coveting, wickedness, deceit, licentiousness, envy, slander, pride, foolishness. All these evil things come from within, and they defile a man” (Mk.7:21-23).  Now hopefully we Christians are not committing murder but the unkind thoughts or harsh judgments we harbor toward others (the roots of murder) may still be very much with us. These are not acts so great as to completely severe our union with Christ, but they do inhibit the flow of His life within us. When we shed our bodies at death do the impurities, the imperfections in our capacity to love, just disappear? If they are in the heart, and we take that with us, then no. 

Every Christian I know believes that we will be "perfect" in heaven.  No more sinful actions and no more sinful movements of the heart.  And we're right to believe so, Scripture teaches that “nothing unclean shall enter” the Heavenly Jerusalem (Rev.21:27).  So if the vast majority of us have imperfect hearts/souls at the moment of death, and yet we will be perfect when fully united to God in heaven, a cleansing must take place!  It's implicit in the understanding of all Christians; the Catholic Church is simply drawing our attention to it.  

There's a lot more to be said.  If you're curious you might want to check out Chapter 6 of The God Who is Love, "Confession and the Ongoing Nature of Salvation."  Let me give the final word in this post to my Anglican brother, C.S. Lewis:

Our souls demand Purgatory, don’t they? Would it not break [our] heart if God said to us, “It is true, my son, that your breath smells and your rags drip with mud and slime, but we are charitable here and no one will upbraid you with these things, nor draw away from you. Enter into the joy”? Should we not reply, “With submission, sir, and if there is no objection, I’d rather be cleaned first.” “It may hurt, you know” - “Even so, sir.”[1]

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[1] Lewis, C.S. The Joyful Christian (New York: McMillan Publishing Company, 1984), p.222.

Like Children

"That's not fair!  You hate me!"

How many times have we heard children say those words after their parents have told them "No"?  Children only hear their parents frustrating their desires for happiness.  It never dawns upon them that their parents could be acting in their (the child's) best interest.  As adults we come to understand that that is exactly what good parents are supposed to do!

"That's not fair!  You hate me!"  Those are the same charges leveled against the Church and individual Christians when they say "no" to behaviors (especially those of a sexual nature).  There is no attempt to step back and consider the possibility that this "no" might have an entirely different motivation - one grounded in reason and authentic love for all concerned.

You would think we would have learned not to jump to conclusions so quickly.

The Die is Cast ...

Watching the news these past few days, and thinking back over the past year of headlines, I feel a tremendous sadness.  We head farther and farther away from God, with many openly thumbing their noses at Him in internet comboxes.  I think my sadness is that of Jesus as He approached His beloved city:

"Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you were not willing. Look, your house is left to you desolate. I tell you, you will not see me again until you say, 'Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.'" (Luke 13:34-35)

He saw the choices she had made, could read the ones she was about to, and knew how it would end.  And yet, He continued to speak out - and He charged the Apostles to continue speaking out after His Resurrection.  In the end, you and I will not be judged on how successful our efforts were; but upon our faithfulness to the call.  And the only way I can see of remaining joyful is to keep our eyes fixed firmly on the Prize that has been promised, knowing that in the midst of the Trinity all the trials and persecutions we suffered in life will melt immediately away.  More than that, God will look upon our endurance of them as beautiful expressions of our love.

GUEST POST - Pope St. Gregory the Great

Yesterday I shared how I felt called to consider the sinful attitudes that lurks beneath the surface.  Today we have a message of hope and encouragement in that regard from a giant of the Faith, Pope St. Gregory the Great.  Coming to us from the Liturgy of the Hours, Pope St. Gregory speaks of the transformation we undergo not just as individuals but corporately as the Church.  At present we are that field composed of wheat and weeds, but the Kingdom will come in all its fullness:

Since the daybreak or the dawn is changed gradually from darkness into light, the Church, which comprises the elect, is fittingly styled daybreak or dawn. While she is being led from the night of infidelity to the light of faith, she is opened gradually to the splendor of heavenly brightness, just as dawn yields to the day after darkness. The Song of Songs says aptly: Who is this who moves forward like the advancing dawn? Holy Church, inasmuch as she keeps searching for the rewards of eternal life, has been called the dawn. While she turns her back on the darkness of sins, she begins to shine with the light of righteousness.

This reference to the dawn conjures up a still more subtle consideration. The dawn intimates that the night is over; it does not yet proclaim the full light of day. While it dispels the darkness and welcomes the light, it holds both of them, the one mixed with the other, as it were. Are not all of us who follow the truth in this life daybreak and dawn? While we do some things which already belong to the light, we are not free from the remnants of darkness. In Scripture the Prophet says to God: No living being will be justified in our sight. Scripture also says: In many ways all of us give offense.

When he writes, the night is passed, Paul does not add, the day is come, but rather, the day is at hand. Since he argues that after the night has passed, the day as yet is not come but is rather at hand, he shows that the period before full daylight and after darkness is without doubt the dawn, and that he himself is living in that period.

It will be fully day for the Church of the elect when she is no longer darkened by the shadow of sin. It will be fully day for her when she shines with the perfect brilliance of interior light. This dawn is aptly shown to be an ongoing process when Scripture says: And you showed the dawn its place. A thing which is shown its place is certainly called from one place to another. What is the place of the dawn but the perfect clearness of eternal vision? When the dawn has been brought there, it will retain nothing belonging to the darkness of night. When the Psalmist writes: My soul thirsts for the living God; when shall I go and see the face of God?, does he not refer to the effort made by the dawn to reach its place? Paul was hastening to the place which he knew the dawn would reach when he said he wished to die and to be with Christ. He expressed the same idea when he said: For me to live is Christ, and to die is gain.

Beneath My Mask

Yesterday seemed to have a theme to it - "Who are you under the surface?"  I came across it both in the Liturgy of the Hours and the first reading at Mass.  St. Dorotheus (4th cent) wrote:

The man who thinks that he is quiet and peaceful has within him a passion that he does not see. A brother comes up, utters some unkind word and immediately all the venom and mire that lie hidden within him are spewed out. If he wishes mercy, he must do penance, purify himself and strive to become perfect. He will see that he should have returned thanks to his brother instead of returning the injury, because his brother has proven to be an occasion of profit to him. It will not be long before he will no longer be bothered by these temptations. The more perfect he grows, the less these temptations will affect him.

And then at morning Mass the Book of Tobit ended in this same vein.  The blind Tobit refused to believe that his wife had earned a bonus through her needlework and she tells him off:

So she retorted: “Where are your charitable deeds now?
Where are your virtuous acts?
See! Your true character is finally showing itself!”  (2:14)

Ouch.  I know Tobit wasn't the last husband to be put in his place by an insightful wife.

I totally identified with both readings.  I will seem to be going along well enough, loving my neighbor; and then someone wrongs me or someone I love, and all of that venom comes to the surface.  Those occasions are when Jesus puts me in front of the x-ray machine and shows me how much work remains to be done.  And I think Dorotheus was right on the money when he said that it will take concentrated effort to overcome such deep-rooted sin.  I don't think I can brush it off forever with a comforting, "You'll do better next time."  No, at some point each of us "must do penance, purify himself and strive to become perfect." We either do it now or in purgatory.  In the end we must be perfect as our Father is perfect (Mt. 5:48).

Making Moral Judgments

"You shall not act dishonestly in rendering judgment. Show neither partiality to the weak nor deference to the mighty, but judge your fellow men justly" (Leviticus 19:15).

We Christians place a high value on empathy and compassion - or at least we should, if we are trying to live in the image of Christ!  Where far too many Christians run into trouble today however, at least in the West, is when we sacrifice truth in the name of compassion - when we excuse, or worse yet affirm, what Christ would call sin in the name of sparing someone's "feelings."  There is no love without truth.  Sentimentality, yes; but not love. 

Love seeks the other's good, his/her objective good - and that is freedom from sin and life with God.  A person can derive pleasure from something that is killing them.  We see it on the natural level:  smoking, abuse of alcohol, contraction of a sexually transmitted disease.  And the same is true on the supernatural level!  Sin kills the soul, and to remain in that death - to never have repented and accepted God's forgiveness - is to step into Hell.  And for a Christian to affirm someone else engaging in what is objectively sinful behavior, or to keep silent when speaking up could save that person's life, is the opposite of love. 

The Christian does not speak up out of the desire to condemn, but to save - exactly as Jesus did.  We need to judge - to evaluate actions - by Christ's criteria. His judgment does not change because we shed a few tears or feel "condemned" by what He tells us; He loves us far too much to cave to that kind of sentimentality.  He knows our lives hang in the balance.  "God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him" (John 3:17).

Why the New Pope will be POWERLESS

Cover of Pope Fiction

- powerless to change Church teaching, that is.  

Every time a new Pope is elected, the media begins to buzz as to whether or not this new Pope will be more "liberal," and bring Church teaching up to date with the "modern" world.  We even hear it among fellow Catholics.  
Will this new Pope:

• ease restrictions on the use of contraceptives?
• recognize same-sex "marriage"?
• allow women to be ordained to the priesthood?
• change Church "rules" on divorce and remarriage?

What these questioners fail to realize is that the Pope does not have the power to change these things.  Why not?  Because they are not his policies; they are Christ's.  

The world has shown itself to be a place of opinion, not moral conviction.  Its understanding of sexuality and the meaning of marriage has morphed in the past 50 years.  But Jesus' understanding has not.  Many, many Christian groups have slowly let go of elements of Christ's teaching in this area.  But the Successor of Peter, because Christ appointed him to share His own role of acting as a Rock to the faithful, cannot. (See here, here, and here.) Take an issue such as "same-sex marriage" - it is oxymoronic to the mind of Christ and thus, must be to the Pope's as well (and honestly, to anyone who believes that Jesus' words were not just those of a man, but God). 

The Pope's ministry is to strengthen his fellow bishops and all of the faithful in living out Christ's teachings.  He has no authority to change them. 

Please keep our new Pope in your prayers; he has a tough row to hoe - but in the end God will make his work fruitful.  A couple of verses to keep in the back of our minds as we pray:
 
"In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.” (Jn.16:33)
 
"Whatever is born of God overcomes the world; and this is the victory that overcomes the world, our faith." (1 Jn. 5:4) 

Jesus asks, "But Who Do You Say That I Am?"

Today the Church celebrates the "Chair of St. Peter"  - Jesus' establishment of the Papacy.  (If you would like to read more, you can click here, here, or here.)  What I want to focus on today is the question Jesus asked Peter, because it's the question he asks you and me - "But you, who do you say that I am?"  

Just last week the Holy Spirit gave me opportunity to repeat that question to someone.  A friend had emailed to ask if she could run a couple of religious questions by me.  When we sat down I expected a couple of factual questions about what Catholics believe or why we do this or that, but my friend dove straight into the deep end:  "I haven't been to church in a long time; but I believe that Jesus is God, and I believe that everything the Bible says is true.  But I also have a very open mind, so on a matter like gay 'marriage,' I think that so long as two people love each other and it makes them happy, they should be able to go ahead and get married.  I am like that on other matters too.  Am I going to go to Hell for that?  I think I try to be the best person I can; could I still go to Hell for thinking differently?"

Alright, first thing I did was to ask to back up from the question of going to hell for a moment and start with what she had told me about her faith.  I reflected back, "You told me that you believe Jesus is God, believe in the Bible; but then you also want to say that certain actions, that you know directly contradict Jesus and the Bible, are alright - so long as they make a person happy.  Seems to me that you are trying to hold two contradictory statements in your mind at the same time."  She smiled and shook her head, acknowledging that she understood that was exactly what she was doing.

I continued, "When you say that you believe Jesus is God, you are saying that you believe He created this world we live in and that He understands what will and will not ultimately lead to our happiness.  Our emotional reactions to something are not the real measure of what is good or bad.  A twelve year old boy might tell you that sniffing model airplane glue makes him feel happy; but you, with a wider knowledge base, understand that it can also damage his brain.  If we believe that Jesus is God and that He understands - objectively, perfectly understands - what leads human beings to happiness; then to say that He is wrong on some point doesn't make any sense.  You can't have it both ways."

"So far as who is going to heaven and hell, no one but God can tell you that.  What I can say is that He has told us - again, objectively speaking - which actions are compatible with the lives of his children and which are not.  But what factors lessen or increase a person's culpability for those actions ... only God knows a person's history - how much of the truth they have been exposed to, their thought processes, the movements of their hearts.  I don't despair for anyone's salvation; I pray for God's grace to be at work in them, just as I pray for it to be at work in me.  Heaven is the culmination of a relationship with God.  And like all relationships, a relationship with God is dependent on our response.  If you had never responded to your boyfriend's dinner invitations, you wouldn't have much of a relationship today.  God invites us to get to know Him in many ways:  meeting Him at church on Sunday, receiving the sacraments, reading that Bible that He went to so much trouble to bring to us.  Do we live our lives in the way He has asked us; or do we tell him that we know better and go our own way?  At the moment of death, when this life ends and everything around us melts away; will we find ourselves next to God or at a distance?  If at a distance then we will experience loneliness, and that loneliness will not end.  That is Hell.  But it was us who moved away from God, not the other way around."

"Jesus asked the apostles and He is asking you, 'Who do you say that I am?'  You answered, 'God.'  Alright.  Now what are you going to do about it?"

My friend has a good head on her shoulders and love in her heart.  I am excited to see what this next year holds for her.

"We're Not Worthy!"

O.K., maybe I shouldn't have quoted Wayne's World on The Journey Home, but it is perfectly apropos with today's readings.  In the first reading we hear Isaiah's reaction to his vision of the Lord, "Woe is me, I am doomed! For I am a man of unclean lips, living among a people of unclean lips; yet my eyes have seen the King, the LORD of hosts!"  Then in the second reading St. Paul states, "I am the least of the apostles, not fit to be called an apostle,
because I persecuted the church of God."  And finally in the Gospel we hear St. Peter, staring at a miraculous catch of fish, tell Jesus, "Depart from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man."  And they're all correct.  When we approach God we should have that same realization of our unworthiness to approach such a magnificent, pure, loving King - given how many times we have failed to love Him as He deserves.

It's a far cry from the general kind of religious sentiment we see in our society.  "I'm a good person.  I've never killed anyone.  I don't cheat on my spouse.  I help out my neighbors when they need it."  That's just being a decent human being, naturally good. (And it totally ignores all the ways we daily slight one another and fail to give our all.)  To draw near to God and spend eternity with Him we need to be supernaturally good.  Jesus calls us to "be perfect" as our heavenly Father is perfect, and that it something completely above us human creatures - at least it is, if we are left to ourselves.

Supernatural goodness comes to us from God.  We hear it in Jesus' response to Peter, "Do not be afraid."  We see it in the angel flying to Isaiah and touching him with a coal from the altar, "now that this has touched your lips, your wickedness is removed, your sin purged." It is St. Paul's "But by the grace of God I am what I am, [an apostle]."  And it is the prayer we make before going forward to receive the Lord in Communion, "I am not worthy that You should enter under my roof, but only say the word and my soul shall be healed!"

There is the Gospel, the Good News - that Jesus came to call the sick, came to call sinners.  Until we recognize that we are sick with sin, we do not believe we need the Physician.  But once we realize how diseased we are, we do not give in to despair - God is the one who will make us clean.  He loves us right where we are - and He loves us so much that He refuses to leave us where we are.

When Our Shepherds Sin ...

I recently wrote a post on why we Catholics continue to profess the holiness of the Church, even amidst sinful decisions by bishops and priests.  We may have another example of that playing itself out in Los Angeles, as more information emerges of Cardinal Mahony’s handling of cases of sexual abuse by priests in the 1980’s.  It is hard to read such things and think about the sins and failures of those given the most sacred of trusts.  Where priests have been guilty of crimes they should of course, like anyone else, be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.   But their actions, as evil as they are, do not cause me to condemn “the Church,” or the offices of presbyter (priest) or bishop that these men held.   What follows is a piece I wrote 15 years ago, focusing on the sinful actions of past popes, that shares some of my reasons why: 

It is common knowledge that the Popes during the Middle Ages were not angels. Several of them lived lives of debauchery. Does that debunk the claim that they possessed the charism of infallibility? Not in the least. It is a scandal, and it damaged the witness of the Church; but it does not damage the integrity of The Faith.

Each Christian reading this can demonstrate the truth of what I am saying for him or herself. We need only think of our own sinfulness, and the many ways in which we have failed to live as Christ commands. Do our sins cause Christ’s Gospel to be any less true? No, not one iota. When we proclaim that Gospel we may sometimes be hypocritical, but what we proclaim is not falsified. Caiaphas, the high priest who along with Pilate condemned Jesus to death, was used by the Holy Spirit to utter prophecy (John 11:49-52). Christ, with perfect foreknowledge, chose Judas to be one of His Twelve Apostles. Why?  Perhaps to prepare us for when the successors of the Apostles,  the bishops, and especially Peter’s Successors, the pope, fall from grace.

Judas’ betrayal did nothing to diminish the office of apostle. Likewise, the personal sinfulness of someone in Peter’s office does not diminish the authority nor function of the Key-Bearer. When we think about atrocities, such as the later Crusades, we have to keep this in mind; they were monstrous, horrendous actions; but they were not instances of the Popes making proclamations as to what constitutes the Deposit of Faith.

Sometimes we have to look at the men sitting in Peter’s Chair as a delinquent parent. We respect them not because of their actions, but solely because of their relation to us (through the Blood of Christ) and the position of authority which God the Father has allowed them to assume. An Old Testament image of this is the relationship between David and King Saul.

Saul was the first King of Israel. His reign started out well, but he eventually fell into disobedience to the Lord’s command. Scripture tells us that because of this, even while Saul reigned, the prophet Samuel was sent by the Lord to secretly anoint a young shepherd, David, as the future king. David eventually killed Goliath, became very close to King Saul and his family, and distinguished himself as a warrior. When David’s popularity in Israel grew greater than even Saul’s, however, the reigning king became jealous and began plotting David’s death. When David caught wind of Saul’s intent he went into hiding. Saul pursued him into the desert. What I want to draw your attention to was David’s reaction: two times the Lord delivered King Saul’s life into David’s hands, but David responded, “The LORD forbid that I should do this thing to my lord, the LORD’s anointed, to put forth my hand against him, seeing he is the LORD’s anointed” (1 Samuel 24:6); “who can lay hands on the LORD’s anointed, and be guiltless? As the Lord lives, the Lord will smite him” (1 Samuel 26:9-10). It was not the man Saul whom David honored but the office which the Lord God had established. Far from being a simpleton, David is the only man whom Scripture calls a man after God’s Own Heart (1 Samuel 13:14). Our attitude in dealing with sinful bishops and Popes must be the same as David’s.

The way God uses sinful human beings to convey His Revelation is one of the truly great surprises in salvation history. It may seem like a tremendous risk on God’s part; perhaps it is simply a commentary on the power of His grace and the Word which He has entrusted to His Church. There is an Old Testament story that gives me a humble chuckle. The Lord “opened the mouth of [an] ass,” a donkey, and gave it the power of speech (Numbers 22:28). I have to laugh at how many other asses He has bestowed the power of speech upon to further the Gospel; I can only hope that when my life comes to an end I will find myself ranked among them.