Hope in God’s mercy

    ONE of the great challenges in dispensing divine mercy through the
sacrament of penance or confession is how to reassure penitents in the
throes of despair that there is always hope, God always forgives, it’s
not yet the end of the world.

    That they manage to come to confession in spite of some crippling
doubts and fears and that gloomy, sinking feeling of depression, is
indeed a good sign. They need all the help and understanding, all the
reassurance even as you deliver also the medicine that may not be
pleasant to the taste.

    It’s indeed tricky to strike the good, healthy balance for this
purpose, and I often think that the only way to do this is really to
make oneself as closely identified with the merciful God through
prayer and sacrifice, infinite patience and good grasp of the moral
doctrine. One needs nothing less than to capture God’s merciful heart.

    There’s also a need for a lot of prudence. Asking the penitent about
the number and the gravity of his falls, necessary for the integrity
of the sacrament, is not easy. But how to reassure the penitents that
everything will be ok is even a lot less easy.

    A confessor, I believe, has to combine the qualities of a father,
friend, judge and doctor to his penitents. And I understand why a
priest, before he hears confession, really has to prepare himself.
That’s because in the confessional, he gets to plumb deep into the
hearts and consciences of the people. Things can be known there, but a
lot of mystery is involved also, for which a lot of prudence is
needed.

    Obviously he is not there out of curiosity. He has to administer
nothing less than divine mercy, the one that can bring back a moribund
soul to life again. He definitely needs the grace of God, a good
training and tested discipline to go through the process.

    He has to be all things to all men, as St. Paul once said, because in
the confessional he is going to meet all sorts of personalities, from
the most delicate soul to the most hardened and treacherous criminal.
He should be able to handle everyone well, with God’s mercy, as each
penitent deserves to be taken care of.

    Let’s remember that Christ was open to everyone, even to the most
vile men who repented. He only had hard words on those who refused to
acknowledge his divinity in spite of all the evidence shown. In short,
on those who refused to live by faith which is a gift given to all of
us. Or on those who are self-righteous.

    In one episode, he clearly spelled out his attitude of mercy by
saying that it is the sick, meaning the sinner, who needs the doctor.
That’s why he went with those who were generally considered then as
public sinners, a fact that elicited criticism from the leading men of
that time.

    Let’s follow the observation of St. Paul who once said that where sin
has abounded, the grace of God has abounded even more. Paraphrasing
that statement, we can say that no matter how miserable we may be in
our weaknesses and sinfulness, the mercy of God will always be
available and in abundance.

    There is no sin that cannot be forgiven by God. That sin against the
Holy Spirit which our Lord said is the one sin that cannot be forgiven
is the sin we commit when we refuse to believe in mercy of God. God
wants to forgive always, but we don’t want to believe in that, then
that’s when our sin remains.

    In one juncture, Christ was asked how many times should a person be
forgiven, seven times? Seven times in the culture of that time meant
many times. Christ replied, not only seven times, but seventy times
seven. Meaning, again in the culture of that time, always or as often
as needed. There’s no limit to divine mercy.

    It might be good to call to mind the example of the repentant thief
who managed to be forgiven just before passing away. And the other
sinners—Mary Magdalene, and all the other characters, including Peter
and the rest of the apostles, and the parables of the lost coin, the
lost sheep and the prodigal son.

    There’s hope in God’s mercy always. What we have to avoid nursing our
sinfulness by our own selves, relying only on our feelings and
estimations, where we will surely get discouraged. We need to go to
God. It’s his delight to forgive!