WE are now in
the season of Lent which is an ideal time
for us to go through the process of repentance, renewal
and
conversion. Given the temper of the times, we should feel
this need
deeply.
We cannot deny
that as Pope Francis noted recently, the
prevalent world culture today appears to have a weak
sense of sin, if
not the loss of such sense. In fact, what are clearly and
objectively
known as sins, like abortion, sterilization, pre-marital
and
extra-marital sex, corruption, etc. are now legalized or
at least
considered as standard operating procedure or as the new
normals.
We have to be
ready to counter this trend. And the secret,
of course, is nothing other than for us to get closer to
God. For it
is only with God that we would know what is objectively
good and evil,
right and wrong, moral and immoral. We cannot rely simply
on our
subjective estimations of these things—personal,
academic, social and
cultural, political and legal, etc.—no matter how
indispensable they
also are.
So we can
deduce that this weakening if not loss of the
sense of sin is due to us ignoring God, or distancing
ourselves from
God. Before we can feel the need for renewal, repentance
and
conversion, we first have to strengthen our belief,
relationship and
love for God. Otherwise, we will fail to get the whole
picture of
things.
Thus, we need
to do a lot of basic catechesis of our
faith, bringing to the fore the reality of God, how he
loves us and
always offers us his mercy. It should also teach us how
we are
necessarily related to him and how that relationship
should be. This
should be done with the gift of tongue so that the truths
of our faith
can find a home in our intelligence and will in the way
each one of us
is.
This is, of
course, no easy job. It’s a tall order. But it
simply has to be done, no matter what difficulty may be
encountered.
We just have to continually importune for God’s grace,
for what we
cannot do, God can always do. Nothing is impossible for
him.
So, the
spiritual and supernatural means of prayer,
sacrifice and recourse to the sacraments, especially
confession and
communion, should be resorted to first of all. These
means have an
effectivity that goes beyond our human perception. We
should just do
them even if we feel there are no visible effects.
Aside from
catechesis which engages us intellectually more
than anything else, we should promote the different
practices of piety
and devotion if only to engage our heart with God too.
These are
important because we need to be engaged with God in the
wholeness of
our humanity as much as possible.
We really
cannot deny that we need continuing repentance,
renewal and conversion because even if we feel that we
are doing well
spiritually and morally, we know that we have feet of
clay, we are
always prone to sin, and we can commit sin and moral
errors without
realizing it.
If our first
parents, created by God in the state of
original justice and thus enjoyed some kind perfect life
where they
had immortality and integrity, managed to fall into sin,
we can just
imagine how we would fare in the drama of our life when
we are born
already with original sin and surrounded by all kinds of
sin.
And as St. John
said in his first letter, “If we claim to
be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not
in us.”
(1,8) We have to be most careful when we tend to think
that we are
good or holy enough.
Our continuing
need for repentance, renewal and conversion
also stems from the fact that we need to be more and more
like God as
he wants us to be. We cannot progress in that direction
without
repentance, renewal and conversion.
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