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| The paralytic healed by Jesus (James Tissot) |
Homily for the Eighteenth Sunday After Pentecost: Repentance, Forbearance, Acceptance
The following homily was given today at a traditional parish.
“I was glad when they said unto me, We will go into the house of the Lord.” (Ps. 122:1.)
Both the Introit and the Gradual for this Mass echo the pilgrim’s joy, the joy of entering into the house of the Lord. In the Epistle, St Paul tells us that in Christ we are given all the graces to be joyful.
The Gospel is quite practical; presenting a three-step process to attain joy, namely, repentance, “… thy sins are forgiven thee,” forbearance, “Rise, take up thy bed,” and acceptance, “… walk into thy house.”
The first step, Repentance, is the profitable use of the sacrament of penance. Scripture and experience sufficiently teach us that sin is an obstacle to joy. “There is no peace for the wicked,” says the Prophet Isaiah, whereas joy is the music of perfect peace, the harmony of complete concord.
It is true that perfect contrition, the deep sorrow for sin motivated by love of God, may obtain for a penitent a remission of any sin, however grave, for, as David testifies of God, “a contrite and humbled heart, O God, thou wilt not despise.” Yet, we should bear in mind that the paralytic in the Gospel was forgiven, not just on account of his contrition and virtue, but on account of the faith of his friends. We read, “Jesus seeing their faith, said to the sick man … thy sins are forgiven thee.” The plurality takes in the friends who brought in the paralytic and the paralytic himself, who consented to be brought and was receptive to the grace of forgiveness.
Taking a leaf out of this book, since no one can be sure his contrition is perfect, we should always join to our probably imperfect contrition the grace of the sacrament of penance and the benefits that accrue to the exercise of obedience and humility implicit in the use of this sacrament. It is for this reason that the Church, as a good Mother, anxious to guarantee the cleansing of her children from the damnable stain of grave sins, obligates every Catholic who has had the misfortune of contracting a mortal sin to go to sacramental confession as soon as possible.
A sin is mortal when, in a grave matter and with full knowledge and free consent, one offends God. Otherwise, the offense is venial. While Catholics are not obliged to confess venial sins, it is the unanimous opinion of the saints and spiritual writers that many spiritual benefits accrue from the confession of venial sins.
To make a valid confession, in addition to being contrite and wishing to amend, we must accuse ourselves of our sins to a priest, indicating the species or kind of sins, their number, and any relevant surrounding circumstances. To further make our confessions profitable, St Francis de Sales advised we avoid generic confessions like “I have not loved God as much as I should; I have not prayed with as much devotion as I should…,” because such a confession does not characterize the conscience, since, according to St Francis de Sales, “Every saint in heaven and every man on earth might say the same thing if they went to confession.”
Instead, we should be specific and exact, saying what our sins or imperfections are and what motivated them. In this way, we not only help our confessor know how to counsel and help us, but we also equip ourselves with the knowledge of how to reform and improve. Only that which is concrete and well- defined can be worked on and improved upon.
To be able to specify our faults and define their motive, we should examine our conscience daily.
Even after a careful examination of conscience, the confession and remission of our sins, we do not usually become perfect overnight. We must therefore learn to carry the burden of our weakness as the paralytic carried his cot. This is the second step towards joy, the act of forbearance.
The burdens we have to bear are sometimes the result of our past sins, such as bad habits formed and inordinate tendencies indulged. Other times, these burdens may be more innate, such as a natural ill temper, an unstable mood, or even a medical condition.
Whatever be their origin and nature, inordinate inclinations and habits should be opposed by the practice of acts of the opposing virtues. As Thomas a Kempis states, “habit is overcome by habit” [My Imitation of Christ, bk 1, chp 21]. It may not be easy at the beginning, but sooner or later, a good habit may take the place of a bad one.
But if these inordinate inclinations persist in us or in our neighbor despite our best effort, then we must patiently put up with them as best we can, trying, without becoming frustrated in the attempt, to diminish their influence by, for instance, avoiding dangerous occasions. These burdens are the crosses which our Lord commands us to pick up daily.
To carry these crosses well, our Lord told us to deny ourselves, that is, from time to time to abstain from certain pleasures or refrain from some freedoms, even innocent ones, to advance the mastery of the will over the appetite, for no one can find joy whose passion is unruly and whose desires are unmortified.
The third step to joy is acceptance, “walk into thy house.” To walk into one’s house is to be at home in one’s own skin, to accept the reality of one’s existence, and to receive one’s being, and all the obligations that come with it, as a gift from God.
This is what has been described as leisure, “man’s happy and cheerful affirmation of his own being, his acquiescence in the world and in God…” [Leisure: the Basis of Culture, p. 39] This state of leisure, of being at home in oneself, is directly opposed to what has been called acedia, that sadness that hangs over one at war with himself, one displeased that he is called to be the hero of his own story, one “who renounces the claim implicit in his human dignity” and refuses the challenge of his state and station, one who, therefore, sinks in despair or attempts to escape from himself through pleasure, fame, material success, amusement, substance abuse, or even work.
Of course, entertainment, amusement, and many such things are leisurely and good if they lead to the recreation of the self, a greater appreciation of one’s state and station as gifts from God, but they are rather harmful if they are merely means to escape reality or kill time.
“Leisure, it must be clearly understood,” writes the Philosopher Josef Pieper, “is a mental and spiritual attitude – it is not simply the result of external factors, it is not the inevitable result of spare time, a holiday, a week-end or a vacation. It is, in the first place, an attitude of mind, a condition of the soul…” [Leisure: the Basis of Culture, p. 40]
This condition of the soul is the readiness to do one’s best and the readiness to leave the rest. That is, to hate only as a patriot, eager to improve what he dislikes, and never as an enemy, eager to destroy what he dislikes. When pressed or stressed, one at home with himself is not strained because he is in harmony with himself and all that God sends to him.
St Francis of Assisi is a great example of one at home in and with himself, one at leisure, which is why he could praise God for Brother Sun and then praise God for Sister Death, for everything he accepts as a gift from God. St Francis of Assisi himself testified that true joy can only come to one who is comfortable in his own skin in his famous discourse with Brother Leo. After stating that perfect joy does not spring necessarily from the success of the religious life, the abundance of miracles, the advancement of natural and supernatural sciences, and even the conversion of everyone to the Catholic faith, he declared:
“If we arrive … drenched with rain and trembling with cold... and exhausted from hunger; and if we knock on the convent gate; … and if the porter tells us that we are impostors …; and if he refuses to open the gate; and if he leaves us outside,… [while we suffer] from cold and hunger; and if we believe… that the porter knew us but was told by God to reject us, then if we embrace the injustice,…without complaining,... this is perfect joy!”
If you suppose this is just a Franciscan hakuna matata, then you should listen to the Prophet Habakkuk. “Though the fig tree does not blossom, and no fruit is on the vines; though the produce of the olive fails, and the fields yield no food; though the flock is cut off from the fold, and there is no herd in the stalls, yet I will rejoice in the Lord; I will exult in the God of my salvation.” [Habakkuk 3:17-18]
But lest any should think that the joy of the Lord comes to us only when we are starving, the Governor Nehemiah announced: “Go, eat fat meats, and drink sweet wine, and send portions to them that have not prepared for themselves: because it is the holy day of the Lord, and be not sad: for the joy of the Lord is our strength.” [Nehemiah 8:10]
At any rate, the joy of the Lord in our souls is our strength. The precondition for this Divine joy, according to our analysis of today’s Gospel, is being jolly comfortable in one’s own skin, which we call acceptance. The precondition for this acceptance is the courageous mortification of our passions and the bearing of our crosses, which we call forbearance. And, finally, the condition for forbearance is the profitable use of the sacrament of penance and of daily examination of conscience.
“I was glad when they said unto me, we will go into the house of the Lord.” [Ps. 122:1.]
