Why Repent?
Homily
Sunday, October 23, 30th Sunday of Ordinary Time, C
Our Lady of Mt. Carmel Parish, Emmett

            No one likes to admit their faults. It’s harder to admit your fault, when your adversary – or even a friend! – accuses you of it, and demands that you admit it. Yet it is healthy for us, supernaturally, spiritually and emotionally to admit our faults. If you love your friend, and you want to help them admit some problem they have, you do well if you choose the route of persuasion, instead of force. Make your friend feel at peace, still loved, not despised by you, when he should come to admit his problem.

And so our Father in heaven wisely treats us. He knows it is hard for us egotistical sinners to admit our faults. So in his Sacred Word, found in the scriptures, he leaves many evidences of how the humble person is saved, how the admission of our sinfulness leads to salvation and every other spiritual good.

And therefore today’s readings point to the sinner who is saved, who is justified, by the prayer of contrition. Contrition is that sadness of will by which we repent from our sinful actions and habits. We can pray with contrition when we repeat after the tax collector, “Lord, have mercy on me, a sinner!”

We contemplate a splendid example of the prayer of repentance in this story Jesus tells, famously known as the “Publican and the Pharisee.” The word “publican” was found in the old English translations, yet our Bishops decided to erase the associations all have with the terms of such a patrimony, and changed the word “Publican” to “Tax collector” in our modern translations.

The Pharisee is said, in this official translation from which we just read, to “take his place.” The real word is “stand,” or even “stand alone.” He should have prayed kneeling or prostrate, but he stood. The Publican “standing afar off,” prayed. He did not feel worthy to plant his sinful self right there in God’s face. The Pharisee, as the Greek term indicates, “prayed to himself,” or “with himself.” The Publican simply said to God, “have mercy,” and struck his breast. Incidentally, we see how important the external aspects of prayer are, for we pray not with just our souls, but with our bodies and souls together. This is why we kneel before the blessed sacrament, for kneeling is the external expression in the body of a soul who says the Publican’s prayer.

There can be impediments to the prayer of repentance. Pride can overwhelm us, when we trust in our own righteousness and despise others. Despair, similarly, can keep one from saying the prayer of repentance, for such a poor soul has given up completely. Today, perhaps the worst enemy souls encounter to the prayer of repentance is that type of spiritual sloth, by which they don’t care, or fail to examine themselves well and take into account how sinful they are. Let us put aside pride, despair, and laziness in our spiritual lives, to recognize our sinfulness and ask our Father for his mercy. For it will be given to all who ask it.

What is the consequence of the prayer of repentance? What happens, what’s the result? In a word: Justification. Jesus says, “The Publican went home justified, not the Pharisee.” Justification is when God makes the soul whole and free from sin. Only justified souls can enter heaven. When a soul is justified, we say it is in the state of grace, which is that supernatural share in God’s very own life. And our prayer has power, as today’s reading from Sirach puts it, personifying prayer, saying that prayer does not retreat from God until it has had a hearing.

Martin Luther had proclaimed that man was justified by faith alone, that his good works were pointless to merit his salvation. That was a grave error, for many reasons. One of the clearest is this, Jesus says that the Publican was “justified.” Both the Pharisee and the Publican had faith; only the one who confessed his sins was justified, not the proud man. Even St. Paul awaited heaven, not relying on his own strength, but on that of his Redeemer.

The spiritual life without repentance is like an ancient city, set with towers and battlements, thick walls and strong gates, and guards watching day and night; but yet there is one spot where there is no wall, a large spot, unprotected by towers or weapons or guards. What point is it for the whole city to protect itself, and leave this glaring hole in the wall? And what point is it for a soul to do so many good deeds, and yet lay open to pride? For the Pharisee was not condemned for any of his good works, for they were in fact good; he was condemned because he “trusted in himself and despised others” in his monumental pride.

So let us all in the whole Church first examine our consciences well, with great detail, and not sloppily, always according to the measure of the teachings of Christ and the Catholic Church which he wills and fills. Next, after examining, let us confess our sins to the priests of the Church, to whom Jesus repeatedly, and especially after the resurrection, instructed, “Whose sins you forgive are forgiven them.” There are many ways the demons try to persuade us to keep away from priests, to reject their guidance, to avoid the confessional! And let us always, always, pray the prayer of repentance, “O God, be merciful to me, a sinner.” Let us pray it night and day, sun or clouds, summer and winter, and always. Then we will make the blood, which Jesus shed on the cross for us, a sacrifice present in the Eucharist until the end of time, victorious over the misery of our sins.