March 24, 2024 - Pastor Message
04/28/2024SIN & REPENTANCE (cont.)
“Be angry and do not sin; let the sun not set over your anger, and do not give a place to the Devil…Let all bitterness, wrath, indignation, shouting, and blasphemy be removed from you, with all malice” (Ephesians 4:26-27, 31).
This weekend we conclude our reflection on the seven Deadly Sins by looking at wrath, lust, sloth, and gluttony. Wrath is the sin of disordered or excessive anger. This is more than just the feeling of anger, over which, like all emotions, we have little or no control. We can feel angry and not be guilty of sin, as Jesus himself did (Mark 3:5), when it springs from a genuine concern for the good of ourselves and others that has been threatened or harmed. Such anger can motivate us to work for positive change, such as the Civil Rights Movement. We sin when our anger springs from selfish pride or is misplaced, as, for example, when we yell at someone who cuts us off in traffic or we become angry with someone else when we are actually the one at fault. We also sin when our anger is disproportionate or we act on our anger by seeking to harm others, as, for example, when we loudly and publicly reprimand a coworker for a minor mistake that no one else knew about and was easily corrected. Left unchecked, the deadliness of wrath becomes contagious. When I direct my anger at others, they will likely respond with anger in turn, until it spirals out of control, leading not only me but many people down the road to ruin.
Lust is the sin of disordered sexual thoughts or actions. Like anger, having sexual desires is not in itself sinful. God creates us “male and female” as sexual beings, and so it is according to his plan that we are drawn to one another, the highest expression of which is genital sexual union between a husband and wife ordered toward all the purposes for which God established it, including interpersonal communion and procreation. We commit the sin of lust when we direct our sexual thoughts and actions in a way contrary to God’s plan and treat ourselves and others as mere objects for physical or emotional gratification, as, for example, when we indulge in pornography, “hooking up”, or marital infidelity. Lust dehumanizes us, leading to even graver sins, like treating an unborn human being we’ve created through sexual intercourse, not as a person with rights and dignity all his or her own, but as merely a lump of tissue to be disposed of at will. While the world often tries to label sins of lust as victimless and harmless, they are anything but.
The sin of sloth means more than just laziness. It is laziness or an aversion toward God and his will for us. It is a willful attitude that God and the things of God, like prayer, Mass and works of Christian charity, are not worth one's time or effort. We can, in fact, be quite busy at being slothful, filling our days with all kinds of secular activities, like sports, shopping, and mindless entertainment, rather than attending to our spiritual lives. These activities are not necessarily sinful in themselves and can even be necessary, like shopping, but they become sinful when we choose to do them instead of building up our relationship with God, the foundation of our entire life.
Gluttony is the sin of excessive or disordered consumption of the good things of creation. While we normally associate this with food or drink, it applies to our use of any goods of creation. God gives us the good things of creation for our good, and we need and have a right to them. But when we use too much of them, as when we overeat, or use them for the wrong purposes, as when we spend hours upon hours indulging in gossip on social media, they become harmful to us and to others. Gluttony can also deprive others of their rights to the good things of creation, as when, for example, we knowingly consume products manufactured using slave labor. When we consume the goods of creation excessively or inordinately, we disrespect their creator and ours.
Fr. Marc Stockton
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