Thanks for this thoughtful essay, and your response to Meg Nakano.
I better understood how, with our fellow-Hebrews, Christians recall that JHVH asks for 'mercy not sacrifice'; and that, for those who accept the message of Jesus Christ, our re-orientation is (or is called to be) profound.
Thank you, Father, and thanks again to Meg for raising an important point. I've tried to address it more closely in my sermon for tomorrow, which I have just posted in English translation.
"Through fasting, repentance, and ritual participation, we can learn that the only effigy we need to burn is the effigy of ourself. Only then can the real self rise from the inner flame." This is a resonant thought, in need of practical unpacking in our daily lives.
It is exceedingly difficult in a world where narcissism is richly rewarded, as well as in any setting that ignores our individual differences and capacities. (I can beat myself up endlessly in repentance, but there are limits to my capacity for ritual participation, for example.)
It also requires a rock-solid faith that there is a "real self" beyond our current existence that will be able to rise from "the inner flames" of a life crushed by the destruction of our life as we knew it: fasting, repentance, and ritual participation alone will not resurrect anything from the ashes of that destruction. It is by grace that we have been born and have survived to date: why must we assume that this existence is not our "real self" and in need of being destroyed so that the imagined "real self" can emerge? This question is going to hover over the great numbers of people whose lives have been destroyed in the current military conflicts, and will be in need of some form of grace-filled resurrection that does not negate the previous self as not being "real".
This is a good question and you are right that what I've written needs unpacking. The first thing to say, I think, is that repentance is absolutely not about beating oneself (or anybody else) up, still less about self-destruction. Repentance is not even regret, though that is the beginning of it, driven by the fear of God, which is the beginning (but not the end) of all wisdom. Rather, repentance is metanoia, the turning of the heart to God for purification of the passions by the Holy Spirit - which, in the word you rightly use, is grace. Our passions - anger, lust, greed etc. - are symptoms of a spiritual sickness which is no more our true self than any physical sickness, such as a cancer, would be. They are parasitical on our self and woe betide us if the sickness becomes our self-definition. We are all made in the image of God, but we all struggle, with God's help, to reflect His likeness. That likeness is, if you like, our truest self; the accretions of sin (and believe me, my soul is encrusted with them) are falsehoods.
The Church offers a very practical first step: confession and absolution. There is a mistaken view of this as a mechanical process - go away and say ten Hail Marys, your sins are forgiven - but when conducted well, it is far from that: it is an invocation of the healing power of Christ which brings forth the gift of tears. This is part of the ritual participation that I am talking about. Going to church unprepared, listening to readings and casually receiving the Sacrament, in my experience at least, has little practical effect on anything. But to make a serious confession, whether directly to God or with a priest, to receive absolution, and to fast before Holy Communion opens one's heart to the vital purgative effect of the Holy Spirit.
Sin does not properly belong to us, but is an illness; God through the Church offers us the remedy to it, but the timeframe for that remedy to be effective is limited to this lifetime. Resurrection comes to all, but whether we experience God as a warming light or a searing fire will depend on how much we have opened ourselves to his healing rays in this lifetime. Those who have died in his grace, however horribly, have nothing to fear in the hereafter. Those who sent them there untimely, on the other hand, do. Surely that is just?
Masterful. Thanks so much.
Thanks for this thoughtful essay, and your response to Meg Nakano.
I better understood how, with our fellow-Hebrews, Christians recall that JHVH asks for 'mercy not sacrifice'; and that, for those who accept the message of Jesus Christ, our re-orientation is (or is called to be) profound.
Thank you, Father, and thanks again to Meg for raising an important point. I've tried to address it more closely in my sermon for tomorrow, which I have just posted in English translation.
"Through fasting, repentance, and ritual participation, we can learn that the only effigy we need to burn is the effigy of ourself. Only then can the real self rise from the inner flame." This is a resonant thought, in need of practical unpacking in our daily lives.
It is exceedingly difficult in a world where narcissism is richly rewarded, as well as in any setting that ignores our individual differences and capacities. (I can beat myself up endlessly in repentance, but there are limits to my capacity for ritual participation, for example.)
It also requires a rock-solid faith that there is a "real self" beyond our current existence that will be able to rise from "the inner flames" of a life crushed by the destruction of our life as we knew it: fasting, repentance, and ritual participation alone will not resurrect anything from the ashes of that destruction. It is by grace that we have been born and have survived to date: why must we assume that this existence is not our "real self" and in need of being destroyed so that the imagined "real self" can emerge? This question is going to hover over the great numbers of people whose lives have been destroyed in the current military conflicts, and will be in need of some form of grace-filled resurrection that does not negate the previous self as not being "real".
This is a good question and you are right that what I've written needs unpacking. The first thing to say, I think, is that repentance is absolutely not about beating oneself (or anybody else) up, still less about self-destruction. Repentance is not even regret, though that is the beginning of it, driven by the fear of God, which is the beginning (but not the end) of all wisdom. Rather, repentance is metanoia, the turning of the heart to God for purification of the passions by the Holy Spirit - which, in the word you rightly use, is grace. Our passions - anger, lust, greed etc. - are symptoms of a spiritual sickness which is no more our true self than any physical sickness, such as a cancer, would be. They are parasitical on our self and woe betide us if the sickness becomes our self-definition. We are all made in the image of God, but we all struggle, with God's help, to reflect His likeness. That likeness is, if you like, our truest self; the accretions of sin (and believe me, my soul is encrusted with them) are falsehoods.
The Church offers a very practical first step: confession and absolution. There is a mistaken view of this as a mechanical process - go away and say ten Hail Marys, your sins are forgiven - but when conducted well, it is far from that: it is an invocation of the healing power of Christ which brings forth the gift of tears. This is part of the ritual participation that I am talking about. Going to church unprepared, listening to readings and casually receiving the Sacrament, in my experience at least, has little practical effect on anything. But to make a serious confession, whether directly to God or with a priest, to receive absolution, and to fast before Holy Communion opens one's heart to the vital purgative effect of the Holy Spirit.
Sin does not properly belong to us, but is an illness; God through the Church offers us the remedy to it, but the timeframe for that remedy to be effective is limited to this lifetime. Resurrection comes to all, but whether we experience God as a warming light or a searing fire will depend on how much we have opened ourselves to his healing rays in this lifetime. Those who have died in his grace, however horribly, have nothing to fear in the hereafter. Those who sent them there untimely, on the other hand, do. Surely that is just?