March 3, 2021
Sin – 1
Dear Friends,
During this Season of Lent, I am sharing some reflections about sin.
Especially in my younger years, our Church put a lot of emphasis on this.
Sin has been understood in this way:
“Sin is an offense against reason, truth, and right conscience; it is failure in genuine love for God and neighbor caused by a perverse attachment to certain goods.
It wounds the nature of man and injures human solidarity.
It has been defined as ‘an utterance, a deed, or a desire contrary to the eternal law.’”
Especially in my younger years, we were regularly reminded in sermons of our sinfulness.
We were told to make an examination of conscience and an act of contrition every day and to go to confession frequently.
As I look back, I think that this emphasis had several effects.
On the one hand, it made us aware of our human weakness and imperfection.
That awareness was and is a good thing.
It can lead us to spiritual and personal growth.
On the other hand, that heavy emphasis on sin had some negative effects.
It was connected with an image of God as the divine judge and punisher.
There was far too little focus on God’s love and mercy.
It almost follows that this heavy emphasis on sin led to unnecessary and even unhealthy guilt.
We were led to feel unworthy in the eyes of God.
Those feelings got coupled with a fear of God – being afraid of God and being preoccupied with eternal punishment if we sinned or did not repent.
And those feelings in turn often led to a poor self-image and low self-esteem.
Let me be clear: I am not denying sin or personal responsibility for our behavior.
I am pointing out the deficiencies of the exaggerated emphasis on sin in the past.
For more reflections on Sin, see the Inbox Inspirations for the next three weeks, March 10, 17, and 24.
Father Michael Schleupner
Quotation above from the Catechism of the Catholic Church.
March 10, 2021
Sin – 2
Dear Friends,
One author tries to describe the core of sin:
“Sin can be described in many ways: as a breakdown of a relationship with God and others; as a failure to love God, others, and self; as a turning away from God.”
I like this as a general understanding of the reality of sin.
With that, we can then identify some specifics.
For example, sin is a breaking of one of the commandments.
So, failing to keep holy the Lord’s day (Third Commandment) or being unfaithful to one’s husband or wife (Sixth Commandment) are sinful actions.
Sin is also failing to live out the fulfillment of the commandments that Jesus teaches in the Sermon on the Mount.
For example, while shoplifting is one literal way that we can steal (Seventh Commandment), so is hoarding and having many more things than we need.
Or, while abortion is one of the ways we can kill (Fifth Commandment), so is gossip and destroying the reputation of another.
So, when we think about sin, we do need to look at the Ten Commandments, but we also need to look at how Jesus extends and fulfills their meaning.
This is why we also need to look at the Beatitudes.
These are Jesus’ description of the “Blessed” person – the person who will be the image and likeness of God and live in the way of Jesus.
For example, when we are not compassionate or empathetic, we are not being merciful – “Blessed are the merciful.”
Or when we feel little concern for migrants and refugees, we are not being social- justice minded – “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness.”
My point: we need to look at the breadth and the depth of the Scripture and then examine our conscience on all that is there.
For more reflections on Sin, see the Inbox Inspirations of last week, March 3, and for the next two weeks, March 17 and 24.
Father Michael Schleupner
Quotation above from The Ignatian Adventure by Kevin O’Brien, S.J. (b.1966. American, Jesuit priest, educator, author, President of Santa Clara University.)
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