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That sin against the Holy Spirit

Sr. JosephMary f.t.i. — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 16:00:24 +0000

In this day and age we find many sorts of sins and evils not just being done openly with impunity but that they are promoted and legalized and even being forced upon society with penalties looming for those not accepting them. So far it is called ‘tolerance’ and so many, even good people, are just told ‘do not judge’ as if judging and being intolerant of evil are themselves the sin. Not so! We are called to judge what is sin, what is right and what is evil. We are to use our conscience to discern these things. So many want the ‘right’ to persist in sin! They are blinded to the eternal consequences. Let us pray for the Light of Christ to shine everywhere with ever greater intensity.

THE SIN AGAINST THE HOLY SPIRIT

Being open to divine mercy.

There is a passage in the Gospel of St Luke (12:9-11) that brings to our attention some remarkably strong words of Our Lord: “And every one who speaks against the Son of man will be forgiven; but he who blasphemes against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven”. St Mark, too, reports the Lord as saying that this blasphemy never has forgiveness and that one who offends in this way is guilty of an eternal sin.

St Matthew in his turn quotes these solemn words of Christ in a context that allows for a better understanding of their import. He relates that the people were astonished at Christ’s miracles, so much so that they wondered: “Can this be the Son of David?” Yet the Pharisees would not submit to the evidence of the many miracles performed before their very eyes. Their only explanation was to attribute Christ’s amazing signs, his divine works, to the agency of the devil. Such was the hardness of their hearts that they would not accept the obvious. It is only by Beelzebub, the prince of demons, they said, that this man casts out demons. Precisely here do we find the unpardonable nature of the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit. They exclude the sources of pardon itself. All sins can be forgiven, no matter how grave they might be. This is because God’s mercy is infinite. What is required that they be forgiven, of course, is that the sinner recognize his sin as sin and believe in the mercy of the Lord The hardness of the Pharisee’s hearts would certainly impede the powerful effect of divine grace.

Jesus designates this attitude as sin against the Holy Spirit. It is unpardonable not because of its gravity and malice but for the closed disposition of the will against God. He who sins in this way deliberately places himself outside the scope of divine pardon. Pope John Paul II warns of the seriousness of this attitude towards grace. Blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, then, is the sin committed by the person who claims to have a ‘right’ to persist in evil- in any sin at all – and who thus rejects redemption. One closes oneself up in sin, thus making impossible one’s conversion, and consequently the remission of sins, which one considers not essential or not important for one’s life.

Today let us ask the Lord for a radical sincerity and true humility so that we may face up to our faults and sins. We pray that we may not become accustomed to our failings, even in the area of venial sin. We should go to Jesus right away for pardon and for the life-giving action of the Holy Spirit. We should ask Our Lady for that holy fear of God so that we never lose our sense of sin and the necessary awareness of our weaknesses. When our vision is clouded, when our eyes have lost their clarity, we need to go to the light. And Jesus Christ has told us that he is the light of the world and that he has come to heal the sick.

United to Christ, we will grasp the horror of sin. Discrimination and sensitivity of conscience.

Today many have lost or are losing their sense of sin. Consequently, they are losing their sense of God. Unnatural behavior contrary to divine law is now treated as the normal course of things in films, on television, in the press … occasionally people deplore the visible sad consequences of this behavior as it affects individuals and society, but without reference being made to the Creator.

At other times, such ‘lifestyles’ are ‘aired out’ to attract public curiosity though without any attempt to treat the subject on a moral plane. Marital infidelity, scandal, defamation, divorce, lying, cheating … There is no shortage of those, including many so-called Christians, who enjoy the drama of such highly-publicized situations, examining them with care, interviewing the protagonists, avidly following their adventures … It seems as if people will do anything but call these actions by their name. In any event, what is wholly forgotten here is the most important factor: what it means to God, to him who gives true meaning to everything human. Some people choose to judge according to principles which leave no room for God, as if He never existed at all or doesn’t play any role in our lives. Ours is by now a truly paganized environment. It has a lot in common with the world of the first Christians, which they transformed just as we have to transform ours.

We will feel the weight of our sins when we see them as offences against God. Sin separates us from God. It makes our soul incapable of listening to the Paraclete, the Holy Spirit. We may even reach that point of insensitivity described by St Augustine: There are those who have committed certain kinds of sins, sins without human victims, which they say are no sins at all. What a gift it is to know the weight of our sins! This knowledge leads us to make many acts of contrition, to desire frequent Confession, to pray for union with God. St John of Avila taught: If you are not feeling dejected because of your sin, then you still don’t realize what it is you have done. Sin weighs on us; sin weighs far more than I can imagine. What then, is sin? It is an unresolvable debt, an unbearable burden which weighs more than anything. The Saint later reiterates: If there can be no heavier burden than this, when don’t we feel the weight of it? It is because we have no appreciation of the goodness of God.

It was in the miraculous catch of fish that St Peter discovered the divinity of Christ and his own smallness. Look at his response: He fell down at Jesus’ knees, saying, ‘Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, 0 Lord’. He besought the Lord to leave him because of his sinfulness. At the same time his eyes and his whole attitude implored the Lord to stay with him forever.

The filthiness of sins requires a point of reference. That standard is the holiness of God. The Christian can perceive a lack of love in himself once he becomes fully aware of the love of Christ. Otherwise, it will be an easy matter for him to justify his weaknesses. Peter had a profound love for Jesus. He knew how to repent for his denials. He would do it making an act of love. Perhaps we have used this prayer to express our own contrition: Lord, you know all things, you know that I love you. We will appeal to the Lord with this act of love whenever we have been unfaithful. Contrition gives strength to the soul. It also imparts hope and a better sensitivity to God.

Let us ask Our Mother Mary, herself so docile to the motions of the Holy Spirit, to teach us to develop a delicate and discriminating conscience. Let us resolve not to become complacently accustomed to the wrong we do. We have to react promptly against even the smallest deliberate venial sin.

Fr. Francis Fernandez (In Conversation with God, volume five)

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Archbishop Sheen on ‘tolerance’

Sr. JosephMary f.t.i. — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 19:00:23 +0000

Ave Maria Meditations

The Curse of Broadmindedness

(from Fulton J. Sheen: Moods and Truths-written in 1932)

“The Catholic Church intolerant.” That simple thought, like a yellow-fever sign, is supposed to be the one solid reason which should frighten away any one who might be contemplating knocking at the portals of the Church for entrance, or for a crumb of the Bread of Life. When proof for this statement is asked, it is retorted that the Church is intolerant because of its self-complacency and smug satisfaction as the unique interpreter of the thoughts of Christ. Its narrow-mindedness is supposed to be revealed in its unwillingness to cooperate effectively with other Christian bodies that are working for the union of churches. Within the last ten years, two great world conferences on religion have been held, in which every great religion except the Catholic participated. The Catholic Church was invited to attend and discuss the two important subjects of doctrine and ministry, but she refused the invitation.

That is not all. Even in our own country she has refused to lend a helping hand in the federating of those churches which decided it was better to throw dogmatic differences into the background, in order to serve better the religious needs of America. The other churches would give her a royal welcome, but she will not come. She will not cooperate! She will not conform! And she will not conform because she is too narrow-minded and intolerant! Christ would not have acted that way!

Such is, practically every one will admit, a fair statement of the attitude the modern world bears to the Church. The charge of intolerance is not new. It was once directed against Our Blessed Lord Himself.

Immediately after His betrayal, Our Blessed Lord was summoned before a religious body for the first Church Conference of Christian times, held not in the city of Lausanne or Stockholm, but in the city of Jerusalem. The meeting was presided over by one Annas, the primate and head of one of the most aggressive families of the patriarchate, a man wise with the deluding wisdom of three score and ten years, in a country in which age and wisdom were synonymous. Five of his sons in succession wore the sacred ephod of blue and purple and scarlet, the symbols of family power. As head of his own house, Annas had charge of family revenues, and from non-biblical sources we learn that part of the family fortune was invested in trades connected with the Temple. The stalls for the sale of bird and beast and material for sacrifice were known as the booths of the sons of Annas. One expects a high tone when a priest goes into business; but Annas was a Sadducee, and since he did not believe in a future life, he made the most of life while he had it. There was always one incident he remembered about his Temple business, and that was the day Our Lord flung his tables down its front steps as if they were lumber, and with cords banished the money-handlers from the Temple like rubbish before the wind.

That incident flashed before his mind now, when he saw standing before him the Woodworker of Nazareth. The eyes of Jesus and Annas met, and the first world conference on religion opened. Annas, ironically feigning surprise at the sight of the prisoner whom multitudes followed the week before, opened the meeting by asking Jesus to make plain two important religious matters, the two that were discussed later on in Lausanne and Geneva and Stockholm, namely, the question of His doctrine and the question of His ministry. Our Lord was asked by a religious man, a religious leader, and a religious authority, representative of the Common faith of a nation, to enter into discussion, to sit down to a conference on the all-important questions of religion-ministry and discipline-and He refused! And the world’s first Church Conference was a failure.

He refused in words which left no doubt in the mind of Annas that the doctrine which He preached was the one which He would now uphold in religious conference, namely, His Divinity. With words, cut like the facets of a diamond, and sentences, as uncompromising as a two-edged sword, He answered Annas : “I have spoken openly to the world . . . and in secret spoke I nothing. Why asketh thou Me? Ask them that have heard Me, what I spoke unto them: behold, these know the things which I said.”

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Vatican denounces the “intransigent religious intolerance” of the Chinese Government

apostolate — Mon, 20 Dec 2010 18:04:36 +0000

December 17, 2010. The Vatican has accused China of oppressing religious freedom and says that attempts to control the conscience of its citizens and interfere in the internal affairs of the Catholic Church does no credit to Beijing. In a strongly worded statement, the Vatican said their attitude is a sign of fear, weakness and intransigent intolerance. The report also states that Beijing has “unilaterally damaged the climate of trust and dialogue” that had developed between the Vatican and the government.

via Vatican denounces the “intransigent religious intolerance” of the Chinese Government.

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Video – Face of Pro-Life #146: The Scandal of Silence

apostolate — Mon, 21 Nov 2011 13:53:18 +0000

Face of Pro-Life #146 – Fr. Angelo on Scandal ( 29min) >>> Play

Ave Maria!

Fr. Angelo discusses the scandal of silence in regard to pro-life issues. Why are people silent who have the power to speak up? Scandal is usually due to someone doing something wrong but it can also be a failure to do what ought to be done. Listen as Fr. Angelo and hostess Corinn Dahm discuss many facets of this epidemic of scandalous silence.

Ave Maria!

Audio (MP3)

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Variety #193: Fr Ward: Do Not Tolerate the Lie

apostolate — Sat, 04 Feb 2012 00:49:22 +0000

Variety #193 – Fr. Thomas Ward ( 18min) >>> Play

Ave Maria!

Fr. Thomas Ward of St. Mary of the Assumption Church in Binghamton, NY, expounds on the sacred truth of the Dignity of the Human Person. This Truth is under attack on all sides by the one who is the “Father of lies” and “Murderer from the beginning.” Father Ward explains how tolerance of lies and sin ultimately leads to the destruction of human life, and the loss of souls.

He then exhorts us to respond with uncompromising truth, generous kindness, and universal charity, all of which must animate the merciful work of the Pro-Life movement.

This sermon was given for the Annual Pro-Life Prayer Service organized by the Broome County Right to Life Committee.

Ave Maria!

Audio (MP3)

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Jun 30 – Homily – Fr Joachim: Hellfire and Brimstone

apostolate — Sun, 30 Jun 2013 14:07:12 +0000

Homily #130630b ( 07min) Play – Fr. Joachim on the strange behavior of Jesus in his determination to be tolerant to the Samaritans, rebuking his disciples for suggesting that He send fire down upon them. Father points out that there are good reasons to be tolerant and bad. The good reasons are to be God-centered, doing the will of God and loving others. The bad reason is to be self-centered and promote self-indulgence in opposition to God.
Ave Maria!
Mass: 13th Sunday in Ordinary Time – Sunday – Form: OF
Readings:
1st: 1ki 19:16-21
Resp: psa 16:1-2, 5, 7-8, 9-10, 11
2nd: gal 5:1, 13-18
Gsp: luk 9:51-62

Audio (MP3)

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Avoiding Modernism & Traditionalism – Jul 28 – Homily – Fr Terrance

apostolate — Tue, 28 Jul 2020 14:44:00 +0000

Fr Terrance gives the homily at Bloomington, IN on Jul 28, 2020, on the parable of the wheat and the tares (weeds) and how we can err by doing too much to correct those who are problematic in the Church as the traditionalists tend to do or too little as the modernists tend to. Listen as Fr. explains the correct time to take corrective action and how doing too much will not only damage the unity of the Church but will lead to the same sin of disobedience and lack of humility that one is trying to correct in others.

Ave Maria!

Mass: Tuesday in the 17th Week in Ordinary Time – Wkdy
Readings: – http://usccb.org/bible/readings/072820.cfm
1st: jer 14:17-22
Resp: psa 79:8, 9, 11, 13 0
Gsp: mat 13:35-43

More on the Readings: http://dev.airmaria.com/r?m=898

Also on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/90378558559/videos/775260033279712
and YouTube: https://youtu.be/YLzgjiFBM2Y

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