THE MERCY OF CHRIST

The All-Merciful Christ

*

How will our Divine Lord welcome a heart returning to Him contrite for past disorders and humbled at the prospects of His Justice? With a Compassion befitting the great and merciful God that He is. When the Son of God came down to earth –tanquam sponsus procédens de thálamo suo– from the brightness of His Glory to the obscurity of the Virgin’s Womb, His Divine Immensity “dwindled to human infancy,” He seems to be in a hurry to divest Himself before our eyes of the mantle of His Sovereign Majesty. He speeds to earth, not with thunder and lightnings, not to open the sluices of the ocean—for Sinai and the Deluge were not so effective!... He comes to earth in search, not of the pure and noble remnant of our race, not to a hidden Noe or a persecuted Elias; He comes in search of sinners: “I came not to call the just, but sinners to repentance” (Luke 5:32); “Christ came into the world to save sinners” (1 Tim. 1:15).

*

* 

*

John the Baptist, the last of the prophets of the Old Covenant, was a second Elias filled with the idea that the Messiah was to come to avenge; One whose axe was put to the root of the tree, Whose winnowing-fan was ready to purge the threshing-floor clean in order to gather the wheat and consume the chaff in unquenchable fire. But no sooner does he set eyes on Jesus than his mind seems to undergo an abrupt change. Who would have imagined that those very lips, which had been preaching punishment and austere penance, would suddenly break out into an expression of the utmost tenderness?

*

*

*

* 

“Behold the Lamb of God! Behold Him Who taketh away the sin of the world!” (John 1:29) – From the rock flowed honey …  

 

The idea launched by the Precursor was well confirmed by Jesus in His actions, His sayings, and His parables. Why not search for them by reading the Gospel? What repentant sinner ever went to Him and was not welcomed with a thrill of fatherly emotion?

*

*

*

*

Now it is a woman caught in the act of adultery whom His Mercy shields from the shower of stones prescribed by the implacable Law, and on whom He imposes no other penalty than to allow her penitential future to be steeped in the ineffable sweetness of His parting words: “Neither will I condemn thee; go, and now sin no more” (John 8:2). Now it is the woman notorious for her light conduct, who in anxious fear takes refuge under the shadow of His compassion, and finds herself rehabilitation, and is defended from her accusers by the irresistible eloquence of the Divine Word. Now it is the publican, a public swindler, whom Jesus goes out of His way to meet and welcome an invitation from; the man who receives Jesus with the fragrant kiss of fourfold restitution for any ill-gotten gains.

*

* 

*

Now it is the good thief, who with three words from a cross next to Thine, O Jesus, steals away Thy very Heart, Thy Forgiveness, and Thy Father’s Kingdom… closed until then even to the Just! Prodigious Mercy Thine that would be accompanied, on Thy entry into the Kingdom, by a criminal executed on the public gallows, as if he were Thy knight-companion!

*

 

* 

 *

*

“I say to you that even so there shall be joy in heaven upon one sinner that doth penance” (Luke 15:7).

 

The sweetness of these words could melt a heart of stone. They are, dear Lord, the refrain closing those three magnificent stanzas of Chapter 15 of Saint Luke –the sinner’s chapter– wherein, O Sovereign Troubadour of Heaven, Thou hast sung the praises of Thy Eternal Pity!

 

How could I so much as dream that my poor soul’s return to Thee had power to move Thee so deeply, to produce in Thee such intense delight, as to rally all Heaven together to join with Thee in festive thrill and cheer?

*

*

How shall I, who have given Thee so much displeasure throughout my long sinful life, refuse Thee at least this moment of delight? My sincere conversion will be a festive occasion not only for Thee, but for all Thy Angels and Saints as well!  

 

Have words ever sprung from Christ’s lips so revealing of His Love for us? Do I not grasp their meaning? Or do I fail to understand what it is to love?

*

*

Taken from The Priest at Prayer by Fr. Eugenio Escribano (1954)



The Human Conscience

Pope Pius XII once said: “The great sin of our century is the loss of the conscience of sin;” an eclipse of the moral conscience. People in our times do not believe in sin anymore. They minimize immoral acts to mere choices that according to them, just because they choose them and like them, are O.K…. and should be accepted by everyone else.

There are sane and evil conducts. Our own consciences tell us when we do something that is not right, that hurts us or others, that is not natural, that goes beyond the limits of our rights and freedom.

In the eclipse, or darkening, of the moral conscience, there are three phases:

1) In the first phase, there is sin and there are sinners. In this phase, sin and sinners and their guilt are recognized. The sinner is held accountable for his crime, sin, and/or fault, and is punished accordingly by the law, after being accused by his own actions and conscience.

2) In the second phase, there is sin, but there is no sinner. All crimes, sins, social and moral misdeeds are attributed to the system, the environment, circumstances, needs, weakness, etc., but there is no mention of guilty persons, no sinners, no punishments.

3) In the third phase, there is no sin… and LONG LIVE the sinner! People believe that no one has the right to tell them what to do and how to do it. In the name of distorted freedom, sinners are rewarded for all the time that they were seen and treated as sinners.

Morals are thrown out the window and are replaced by laws that are really usurpers of Divine Truth and true liberty. What was considered sinful becomes a virtue; virtues are belittled, mocked, repudiated. Public sinners are considered heroes, role models of society, and become the idols of the youth.

All of this is a process of a moral involution in which the human conscience is silenced, obscured, and disfigured. According to Pius XII, “the human conscience is the tabernacle of man,” which protects and defends the voice of God in and for man…. so that we may know what we do right and what we do wrong.

In human beings, there are two consciences: the psychological conscience and the moral conscience. The psychological conscience is the indicative perception of what we actually do and feel. For example, when we are hurt, hungry, tired, thanks to our psychological conscience, we feel pain, hunger, and the desire to relax.

The moral conscience is the imperative appreciation of what we should do and feel. Our moral conscience tells us how we should behave in certain situations, how we should respond to certain events, and when we do something that is right or wrong, good or evil. This moral conscience is what makes us, humans, different and even superior to irrational animals because it is superior to the psychological conscience.

For example, during Lent we usually fast. Even though our psychological conscience tells us that we are hungry, after hours without eating or drinking anything, our moral conscience tells us that we should not eat or drink anything so as not to break the fast. This is due to the fact that our consciences are witnesses of our actions; it is the herald or messenger that announces the decrees of the King (according to St. Bonaventure). We are all born with it (moral conscience), and it guides our steps when it comes to deciphering whether what it tells us comes from God (King) or not.

In order to find out, anytime we want, whether what our conscience commands us to do, or not do, comes from God, there are three things that we should always do:

1) To pray sincerely, to immerse ourselves in the depths of God.
2) To apply the holy virtue of Prudence: to use reason, to act with logic, to ask when we do not know or need advice, to anticipate future dangers or obstacles, to be cautious, to analyze circumstances and situations, and to use our intuitions wisely.
3) To exercise ourselves in the virtue of Charity in order to form and reform our moral conscience. We can achieve this by:
a) Doing good and to opposing and resisting all evil.
b) Making the resolution: “I will NEVER do evil under the pretext of getting something good.”
c) Never doing to another person what we would never consent anyone to do to us.
d) Never cooperating voluntarily in evil against another person.
e) Accepting the dictum that there is no liberty of conscience without TRUTH, but only within TRUTH. This last point concerns politicians more than others because they are the ones in charge of making, abolishing or distorting laws that might, and usually do, fall under the turf of morality such as abortion, contraception, capital punishment, stem cell research, etc.

~Fr. Hasbún