3rd Sunday of Lent
(C)
Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP
OLR, NOLA
We
– all of us! – are sinners. And all of us need to repent. That's
the Word of God spoken to us this evening. Now, you might respond to
this bit of news with a heartfelt, “Duh, Father. Like I don't know
that.” Or maybe a less enthusiastic but still sincere, “I'm
trying, Father, I really am. Lord, help me!” Or you might choose to
push back a little by saying, “Come on, Father. . .the Church got
ride of all that Sin and Repentance Stuff years ago. Fire and
brimstone is so outdated and offensive.” What you might think
but not say is this: “Yeah. I'm a sinner. But I know some
people who are a WHOLE LOT worse sinners than me! Compared to THOSE
people, I'm a regular Mother Teresa!” Objectively speaking, you're
probably right. I doubt anyone here this evening is a serial rapist,
a child molester, or a cannibal. I doubt anyone here is secretly
worshiping Satan, or planning a terrorist bomb attack on St. Louis
Cathedral during the Easter Morning Mass. Nonetheless, the Word of
God spoken to us tonight tells us that we are all sinners, and that
we all need to repent. My neighbor's greater sins do not diminish my
small sins. And my repentance can show him a better way.
You
don't have to be a church historian or theologian to know that
preaching about sin has become something of a fashion faux-pas
in the past few decades. In an effort to bring the Church “up to
date,” we've largely abandoned the notion of sin and prefer instead
to talk about mistakes, struggles, addictions, or lapses in judgment.
All of these things happen, of course, but not all mistakes,
struggles, addictions, and lapses in judgment are sinful. Sin is
something else entirely. At its root, sin is a deliberately chosen
thought, word, or deed that prevents us from receiving God's grace, a
conscious decision we make to refuse God's offer to share in His
divine life. Large or small, sin blocks the free-flowing graces we
could be receiving from the Father. If you need an image, try this
one, familiar one: sin
is the hairy, gelatinous gunk clogging your spiritual pipes.
At baptism you were given the gift of freedom, the grace of
redemption, so you – and only you – can freely receive the divine
help you need to blow your pipes clean. The first step is recognizing
the sin in your life. The next step is repentance, conversion. Jesus
warn us, “. . .if you do not repent, you will all perish.”
You
might think that our Lord is using scare tactics here, trying to
frighten us with tales of eternal fire and torment. He's not. He's
simply stating fact. Sin prevents us from receiving God's grace. Sin
prevents us from participating in the divine life. If I die outside
the divine life, then I live eternally in the same way I live
temporally. . .outside the divine life. That's hell. Telling me that
I am sinning and need to repent is an act of love not hate or
judgment. Imagine a friend is driving at night on I-10 toward Baton
Rouge. She calls you to chat. Suddenly, your friend turns off the
headlights, crosses the median, and drives a 100mph the wrong way.
All the while she's telling you what she's doing. You can hear horns
blowing, tires squealing, sirens in the background. What do you say
to her? Do you say, “Well, I understand your choice to drive the
wrong way on I-10 at 100mph, and I want to affirm you in your
decision. If you believe – in
good conscience –
that these actions will make you happy, then go for it!” NO! Of
course, you don't. You beg her to recognize the foolishness of her
choices. You tell her that if she continues on her chosen path, she
will likely crash and burn. So, you beg her to stop, turn around, and
head the right way. Telling her the likely consequences of driving
recklessly isn't judgmental. It's an act of love. And Christ has
given us the benefits of his supreme act of love – his sacrifice on
the cross.
One
of the benefits of Christ's sacrifice for us is our ability to
recognize sin and repent. The Devil obscures this benefit by tempting
us to minimize our sin by comparing it with the sins of others. (You
would think your friend insane if she said that her driving the wrong
way on I-10 at 100mph at night was OK b/c some guy last week crashed
and burned doing the same thing at 120mph). The temptation here is
not just to minimize my sin but to call it something other than what
it is – a mistake, a lapse in judgment, something I'm struggling
with. Call it anything but what it is: a sin. You see, the Devil
knows that you don't need to repent when you make a mistake. Mistakes
aren't deliberate. Mistakes are just. . .mistakes. So, he tempts you
to compare, measure your “mistakes” against the sins of others
and conclude that you don't really need to repent. Jesus says that we
do. We do need to repent. Or perish. Permanently.
Lent
is our time to look deeply and carefully at our lives in Christ. Not
through some sort of ghoulish fascination with human failure. Or a
legalistic microscope, nit-picking every choice. We can and should
exam our lives in Christ with the joy and freedom we have received as
heirs to the Kingdom. We all need the free-flowing graces we can only
receive from the Father. Unclogging our spiritual pipes can and
should be happy work. Think of Lent as your chance to become a Holy
Roto-Rooter!
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