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II.4. The Sacrament and the Virtue of Penance

Summary. — I. How God manifests His mercy by forgiving sins. — II. The sacrament of penance ; its elements : Contrition, its particular efficacy in the sacrament ; the confession of sins constitutes a homage to the humanity of Christ ; satisfaction is only of value if it is united to the expiation made by Jesus. — III. The virtue of penance necessary so as to maintain within us the fruits of the sacrament ; nature of this virtue. — IV. Its end: to restore order and make us like to Jesus crucified. General principle and divers applications of its exercise. — V. How in Christ we find the value of our acts of abnegation and at the same time, consolation. — YI. Following the example of the Church, to unite the acts of the virtue of penance to the sacrament.

N explaining the symbolism of baptism to the first Christians, St. Paul writes to them that they must no longer, through sin, let the divine life received from

Christ die in them: Ultra non serviamus peccato*. The Council of Trent says”: If our gratitude towards God, Who has made us His children by baptism, was equal to this ineffable gift, we should keep the grace received in this first sacrament, intact and pure?”.

There are privileged souls, truly blessed, that never lose the divine life. But for others, for those who succumb to sin, is there no means of recovering grace, of rising anew to the life brought to us by Christ ? Yes, this means exists in the sacrament of penance, instituted by Christ Jesus, the Man-God. It is a wonderful monument of divine wisdom and mercy in which God has harmonised these two things : He finds in it His glory while, at the same time, He grants us forgiveness.

MA

You know that magnificent coliect that the Church, guided by the Holy Ghost, places on our lips in the Mass for the tenth Sunday after Pentecost: ”O God Who dost manifest Thy almighty power above all in showing pardon and pity; multiply upon us Thy mercy”: Deus qui omnipotentiam tuam parcendo maxime et miserando manifestas, multiplica super nos misericordiam tuam.1

That is a revelation God gives us by the mouth of His Church. It is in forgiving us, parcendo, in having pity, miserando, that God shows above all, maxime, His power. In another collect, the Church says it is one of God’s most exclusive properties ” always to have mercy and to spare”: Deus cui proprium est misereri semper et parcere °.

Pardon presupposes debts to be forgiven; pity and mercy can only exist where there is misery. What is the meaning of the word: musericordia? It is the taking, in some manner, the misery of others into one’s own heart”. Now God is goodness itself and infinite love. Deus caritas est *; and, in presence of misery, His goodness and love become mercy. That is why we say to God: Deus meus, misericordia mea, "O my God, Thou art my mercy *”.

In the collect I have just quoted, the Church beseeches God to ” multiply upon us His mercy”: Multiplica super nos misericordiam tuam. Why is that ? Because our miseries are immense. It is of them we can say: Abyssus abyssum invocat, the abyss of our miseries, of our faults, of our sins, calls upon the abyss of Divine mercy. We are all indeed miserable, we are all sinners, some more than others, it is only a question of degree: In multis offendimus omnes, says the apostle St. James*; and St. John says: "Tf we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us*”. Hegoes even further for he adds that if we say this ”’ we make God a liar”: Si dixerimus quoniam non peccavimus, mendacem facimus eum™. Why? Because God obliges us all to say: ” Forgive us our trespasses”, Dimitte nobis debita nostra. God would not oblige us to make this demand if we had no debita. We are all sinners; this is so true that the Council of Trent has con-

  1. Collect for the Rogation days. "O God, to Whom it alone belongs always to have mercy and to spare, favourably receive our prayer, that we and all Thy servants, who are bound by the chain of sins, may, by the compassion of Thy goodness, mercifully be absolved." — 2. Misericors dicitur aliquis quasi habens miserum cor. S. Thom. ], q. XXI, a. 3. — — 3. I Joan. 1v, 8. — 4. Ps. tv, 18. — 5. Jac. m, 2. — 6. Si dixert- mus guoniam peccatum non habemus ipsi nos seducimus et veritas in nobis non est. I Joan. 1, 8. — 7. Ibid. 1, 10. demned those who say it is possible to avoid all sin, even venial sin, without a special privilege from God such as was granted to the Blessed Virgin Mary*. Therein lies our misery.

But this misery must not discourage us. God knows it and that is why He has compassion on us ” as a father hath compassion on his children”: Quomodo miseretur pater fiiorum, misertus est Dominus*. For He knows that not only are we taken out of nothing, but formed of the dust of the earth. Quoniam ipse cognovit figmentum nostrum ®. He knows this mass of flesh and blood, of muscles and nerves, of misery and weakness that constitutes the human being and inclines us to fall so easily into sin, and taking this into account, He has made it possible for us to return to Him not once only, but as our Lord says *, seventy times seven, that is to say, an indefinite number of times.

God places His glory in relieving our misery, in forgiving our faults; He wills to be glorified in manifesting His mercy towards us because His beloved Son has satisfied for us. Throughout eternity, says St. John, we shall sing a canticle to God and to the Lamb. And what will this canticle be? Will it be the Sanctus of the angels ? God did not spare those that rebelled; from the moment of their first revolt, He cast them down for ever, because they had not these weaknesses, these miseries, that are our lot. The faithful angels sing the holiness of God, the holiness that could not for an instant suffer the defection of the rebels. But as for us, what will our song be ?...That of God’s mercy: Misericordias Domini in aeternum cantabo®*; this verse of the psalmist: will be like the refrain of the canticle of love we shall sing to God. We shall sing also to the Lamb. And what shall we sing to Him ? Redemisti nos, Domine, in sanguine tuo ®: ” Thou hast redeemed us, O Lord Jesus, in Thy precious blood”; Thou hast had such pity on us that Thou didst shed Thy blood to save us from our miseries, to free us from our sins, as we say every day in Thy name at Mass: ” This is the chalice of My blood which was shed for the remission of sins”, Effundetur in remissionem peccatorum.

Yes, there is great glory due to God for this mercy He uses towards the sinners who make their claim through the satisfactions of His Son Jesus. Hence we can understand that one of the greatest affronts that can be made to God is to doubt of the mercy and pardon He gives us through Jesus Christ.2

However, after baptism, this pardon is only granted to us if we bring forth ” fruits worthy of penance’”. In this, says the Holy Council of Trent, there is a great difference between baptism and the sacrament of penance. For an adult, it is true, baptism requires the detestation of sin and the resolution to shun it, but no special acts of satisfaction or reparation are demanded from him. Read the rite of baptism: you will find no mention of any work of penance to be accomplished. It is the total and absolute remission of sin and the penalty incurred by sin. Why is that ? Because this sacrament, the first as to date, constitutes the first fruits of the blood of Jesus given to the soul.

But, continues the Council, if after baptism, after we have been grafted upon Christ Jesus, after we have been ” delivered from the slavery of sin and of the devil and have become temples of the Holy Ghost, we voluntary fall again into sin, we can only recover grace and life on the condition of doing penance; thus has it been established by Divine justice, as is most fitting ?”.

Now, penance may be considered as a sacrament, and also as a virtue that manifests itself by acts proper to it.

_ Let us say a few words about both.

III

The sacrament was instituted by Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, to restore to us the life of grace when it has been lost after baptism; it contains in itself unlimited grace of forgiveness. But in order that it may act in the soul, all obstacle opposed to this action must be removed. And what is the obstacle ? Sin and attachment to sin.

The sinner must make the avowal of his sin — integral avowal as to mortal sin; then he must destroy the attachment to sin by contrition and the acceptation of the imposed satisfaction.

As you know, contrition is the most important of all these

  1. Luc. m, 8. — 20)5e@8s; “XIV, cap. 2 "and)a:

THE SACRAMENT AND THE VIRTUE OF PENANCE. IQ}t essential elements, as regards the penitent. Even if the accusation of sin should be materially impossible, the necessity of contrition would remain. Why is that? Because by sin, the soul turned away from God to take pleasure in the creature; if we wish God to communicate Himself to us anew and restore life to us, we must repudiate any attachment to the creature in order to turn again towards God. This act includes the detestation of sin and the firm purpose of no more committing it; otherwise the detestation of sin would not be sincere. Such is contrition’. As the word indicates, it is a sentiment of sorrow that crushes the soul enlightened as to its unhappy state and its offence against God, and that causes it to return to Him.

Contrition is perfect when the soul is sorrowful for having offended God Who is infinite Goodness: this perfection proceeds from the motive which is the highest possible, namely, the Divine Majesty. But it goes without saying that this contrition, perfect in its nature, admits of a whole series of- degrees in its intensity. Whatever be this degree of intensity, the act of contrition, being perfect in its motive, effaces the mortal sin at the moment the soul makes this act. But in the present economy, in virtue of the positive precept ordained by Christ, the accusation of mortal sins remains obligatory when it is possible.

Imperfect contrition, such as proceeds from the shame felt on account of the sin, of the chastisement merited by sin and of the loss of eternal beatitude, has not of itself this effect of effacing mortal sin; but it suffices to do so, with the absolution given by the priest.

These are the truths I must simply recall to you. But there is one important point to which I want to draw your attention.

Outside confession, contrition already places the soul in opposition to sin; the hatred of sin to which contrition gives rise constitutes the beginning of the destruction of sin. This act is in itself pleasing to God.

In the sacrament of penance, contrition (as, moreover, the other acts of the penitent: accusation of faults and satisfaction) bears a sacramental character. What does this signify ? In every sacrament, the infinite merits gained for us by Christ are applied to the soul in order to produce the special grace contained in the sacrament. The grace of the sacrament of penance is to destroy sin in the soul, to weaken the remnants of sin and to restore life; or if there are only venial faults, to remit them and increase grace. In this sacrament, the hatred of sin felt by Christ in His agony and upon the Cross : — Dilexisti justitiam et odisti iniquitatem *, — passes into our soul there to produce the destruction of sin. This destruction of sin effected by Christ’s substitution of Himself for us in His Passion is reproduced in the penitent. Contrition remains what it is, even outside the sacrament: 1. e., an instrument of death to sin; but in the sacrament Christ’s merits give to this instrument, as it were, infinite and supreme efficacy. It is at this moment, Christ washes our souls in His precious Blood: Christus lavit nos a peccatis nostris 1s sanguine suo ?.3

Never forget that each time we receive this sacrament worthily and with devotion, even if there were only venial faults to be confessed, the blood of Christ is poured abundantly on our souls to revive them, to strengthen them against temptation, to make them generous in the struggle against attachment to sin, and to destroy in them the roots and effects of sin. The soul finds in this sacrament special grace to uproot its vices and purify itself more and more so that the life of grace may be recovered or increased in it.

Before confession, let us then always arouse our faith in the infinite value of the expiation of Jesus Christ. He bore the weight of all our sins: Iniquitates nostras ipse portavit . He offered Himself for each one of us: Dilexit me et tradidit semetipsum pro me. His satisfactions are superabundant; He has acquired the right of forgiving us: there is no sin that cannot be washed away by His divine blood. Let us stir up our faith and our confidence in His inexhaustible merits, the fruits of His Passion. I have said that when He journeyed through Palestine and one came to Him to be delivered from the devil, Christ Jesus required faith in His divinity; it was only to faith He granted the healing of diseases or the remission of sins: ” Go, thy sins are forgiven, thy faith hath made thee whole”. It is faith that must, before all, accompany us to this tribunal of mercy: faith in the sacramental character of all our acts; faith especially in the superabundance of the satisfaction made by Jesus to His Father for us.4

Certainly, our acts (contrition, confession, and satisfaction), do not produce the grace of the sacrament ; but besides being previously necessary in order that the grace of the sacrament may be applied to us,-since they are ” like the matter of the sacrament?”, the degree of this grace is measured, in fact, by the dispositions of our soul.

That is why it is an eminently useful practice to beg from God the grace of contrition on the morning of the day of confession while assisting at the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. Why ? Upon the altar, as you know, the immolation of Calvary is renewed. The Holy Council of Trent declares that ” the Lord, appeased by this oblation, grants the grace and gift of penance, and forgives, on account of it, all crimes and sins, however enormous they may be?”.

Does the Mass then forgive sins directly ? No, that only belongs to perfect contrition and to the sacrament of penance. But when we assist devoutly at this sacrifice which is the same as that of the cross, when we unite ourselves to the Divine Victim, God gives us, if we ask with faith, sentiments of repentance, of firm purpose, of humility and confidence, which lead us to contrition and make us capable of receiving with fruit the remission of our sins, acquired for us by Jesus at the price of His Divine Blood.

To contrition must succeed confession. The sacrament of penance was instituted under the form

  1. The Holy Council of Trent says: " Like the matter." Quasi materia. ay XIV, cap. 3). The Catechism of the Council of Trent (Ch. xx, § 3.) gives the following explanation: "It must be pointed out to the faithful that the great difference between this sacrament and the others, is that the matter of the latter is always something natural or artificial, whilst the acts of the penitent, contrition, confession, and satisfaction are, as the Holy Council of Trent says, like the matter of this sacrament, And these acts are necessary on the part of the penitent for the integrity of the sacrament and for the entire remission of sins. This is of divine institution. Likewise, the acts we are speaking of are considered as even part of the sacrament. And if the Holy Council simply says that the acts of the penitent are like the matter of the sacrament, that is not to say they are not the true matter of it; but that they are not of the same kind as the other sacramental matter, which are taken from without, like the water in baptism and the chrism in confirmation. "— 2. Hujus sacrificti oblatione placatus Dominus gratiam et donum poenitentiae concedens, crimina et peccata etiam ingentia dimittit. Sess. XXII, cap. 2.

Christ, the life of the soul. 33 of judgment. ” All that you bind or loose on earth shall be bound or loosed in heaven; those sins shall be remitted that you remit.” But it is for the culprit to accuse himself to his faults to the judge who is to pass sentence. And who is this judge ? The avowal of my sins is due to God alone; no one, neither angel, nor man, nor devil, has the right of penetrating into the sanctuary of my conscience, into the tabernacle of my soul. God alone merits this homage, and He claims it in this sacrament, for the glory of His Son Jesus.

I have said, in speaking of the Church, that since the Incarnation, God wills, in the ordinary economy of His providence, to govern us by men who supply the place of His Son for us. It is like an extension of the Incarnation and, at the same time, a homage rendered to Christ’s holy humanity. Why is that ?

To redeem us from sin, and restore divine life to us, Christ, the Incarnate Word, descended into the depths of humiliation; it was as man that He humbled Himself, that He suffered, died and expiated. And because He thus humbled Himself to save the world, Christ has been exalted by His Father: Exinanivit semetipsum... usque ad moriem crucis: PROPTER QUOD et Deus exaltavit illum+; the Father wills to glorify His Son as man: Clarificavi et ‘adhuc clarificabo?. And what is the glory He gives to Him? He makes Him sit at His right hand in the heights of heaven; He wills ” that in the name of Jesus every knee should bow... and every tongue should confess” that Jesus is the only Saviour*; for the Father has given Him all power “in heaven and in earth*”. And among the attributes of this power is that of judging every soul. Jesus Himself tells us: ” The Father... hath given all judgment to the Son that all men may honour the Son”; because His Son, in His humanity, won the right of being the Redeemer of the World: Neque Pater judicat quemquam, sed omne judicium dedit Filho ut omnes honorificent Filium®... quia Filius hominis est ®. Christ has been established by His Father the Judge of heaven and earth; here below, He is the merciful Judge; at the last day, as Our Lord declared at the time of His Passion, ” The Son of Man shall come in the clouds ye great power and glory*”, to judge the living and the ead. .5

Such is the glory the Father wills to give His Son; and it is the glory He wills we should give Him in this sacrament. Suppose a man has committed mortal sin; he comes before God, he deplores his sin; he afflicts his body with macerations and promises himself he will accept every expiation. God says to him: ” That is well, but it is My will you should acknowledge and declare the power of My Son Jesus, by submitting yourself to Him in the person of the one who represents Him for you; and that one is he who, on the day of his priestly ordination, received communication of My Son’s judicial power”. If the sinner will not give this homage to the holy humanity of Jesus, God refuses to hear him; but if he submits with faith to this condition, then there are no sins, no crimes, no iniquities that God does not forgive and for which He does not renew the pardon as often as the repentant and contrite sinner beseeches Him to do so.

This confession must be made from a heart touched by repentance. Confession is not a narration, it is an accusation; one must come to it like a criminal. before his judge. This simple and humble confession has two enemies: routine and scrupulosity. Routine results almost invariably from habit; the best means of destroying it is to arouse our faith in the greatness of the sacrament. As I have said, each time that we go to confession, even when we have only to accuse ourselves of venial faults, the blood of Jesus is offered to His Father to obtain pardon for us. Scruple . consists of taking the accidental for the essential, of dwelling, without reason, on details and circumstances that add nothing to the substance of the sin, if even there be a sin. In confession, we must have the intention of saying all we have on our conscience; this becomes easy if we have the excellent habit of examining every evening the actions of the day. If there is a doubt, and this doubt weighs on us, we must accept the weariness that often results from this as part of the penance, and say what we know. God does not will that confession should be a torture for the soul, but on the contrary that it should bring peace ”.6

Look at the Prodigal Son. When he returns to his father, does he dwell on endless distinctions? We cannot imagine him doing so. And yet his father forgives all, forgets all and prepares a feast to celebrate his son’s return.

So it is with our heavenly Father. God finds His glory in forgiving us, because all forgiveness is granted us in virtue of the satisfaction made by Jesus Christ, His beloved Son. The precious blood of Jesus was shed to the last drop for the remission of sin and the expiation Christ offered to the justice, holiness, and majesty of His Father is of infinite value. Now each time God pardons us, each time the priest gives us absolution, it is as if all the sufferings, all the merits, all the love, all the blood of Jesus were presented to His Father and applied to our souls to restore life to them or to increase it when it is only a case of venial sins. Sacramentum paenitentiae (instituit) quo lapsis, post baptismum, beneficitum mortis Christi applicatur?. "May Jesus Christ absolve thee”, says the priest, “and I in virtue of His authority, absolve thee from thy sins”. Can one forgive the offence committed against another ? No; yet the priest says: ” I absolve thee”. How can he say it ? Because it is Christ Who says it by his mouth.

At each confession, we seem to hear Jesus say to His Father: ”O My Father, I offer Thee for this soul, the satisfactions and merits of My Passion; I offer Thee the chalice of My Blood shed for the remission of sins”. Then, just as Christ ratified the judgment and the pardon given by the priest, so the Father in His turn, confirms the judgment and pardon granted through His Son. He says. ”TI also forgive thee”.

Those are words to establish the soul in peace. Think what it is to receive from God the assurance of pardon. If I have offended a loyal man and he, holding out his hand to me, says: ”I forget all”, I do not doubt of his forgiveness. In the sacrament of penance, it is Christ, the Man God, Truth in person, Who says to us: ’I forgive thee”, and can we doubt His forgiveness ? No, we cannot doubt it; this pardon is absolute and irrevocable. God says to us:” If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as quam interdum in viris pits et cum devotione hoc sacramentum percipien- tibus, conscientiae pax et serenitas, cum vehementi spiritus consolatione consequi solet. Concil. Trid. Sess. xiv, cap. 3. 1. Concil. Trid. Sess. xiv, cap. 1.

THE SACRAMENT AND THE VIRTUE OF PENANCE. IQ7 white as snow’?”. He says again: ” I have blotted out thy iniquities and thy sins as a mist?”. God’s forgiveness is worthy of Himself. What a king does is royal; what a God does is divine: let us believe in His love, in His word, in His forgiveness.

This act of faith and confidence is extremely pleasing to God and to Jesus, for it is homage rendered to the infinite value of Christ’s merits; it proclaims that the fulness and universality of the pardon God grants to men here below is one of the triumphs of the blood of Jesus.

To the contrition of the heart and to the confession of the lips, must be joined the humble acceptation of the satisfaction imposed.

This satisfaction is an essential element of the sacrament. In former days, the work of satisfaction to be accomplished was considerable. At present the satisfaction imposed by the confessor for the penalty due to sin is reduced to a few prayers, an almsdeed, or a practice of mortification. Certainly Our Lord satisfied for us superabundantly ; but, says the Council of Trent *, equity and justice require that having sinned after baptism we should bring our share of expiation in payment of the debt contracted by our sin.

This satisfaction, being sacramental, Christ Jesus, through the mouth of the priest who represents Him, unites it to His own satisfactions. That is why it is of great efficacy in producing ” death to sin” in the soul. In making this satisfaction for our sins, says the Holy Council of Trent, we render ourselves conformable to Jesus Christ Who offered His Father infinite expiation for our sins. The Council goes on to say that ” these works of satisfaction while being accomplished by us, only however derive their value from our union with Jesus Christ; without Him indeed we of ourselves can do nothing ; but strengthened by His grace, we are able to suffer all things. And so all our glory is to belong to this Christ in Whom we live and in Whom we make satisfaction when we bring forth worthy fruits of penance ; it is from Him that these acts of satisfaction derive their merit, it is by Him they are offered to the Father, and it is for His sake that the Father accepts them‘ ”.7

You see what a wonderful sacrament the wisdom, power and goodness of God has ordained for our salvation. God finds in it His glory and that of His Son, for it is in virtue of the infinite merits of Jesus that pardon is bestowed upon us and divine life restored or increased. Let us join, even while here on earth, in singing the canticle sung by the elect to the Lamb. O Christ Jesus, immolated for us, Thou hast redeemed us by Thy precious blood, all praise, ali power, all glory and all honour be to Thee for ever and ever !

LE

Even when God has forgiven us, there remain in us the remnants of sin, evil roots ever ready to spring up and bring forth evil fruits. Neither baptism nor the sacrament of penance take concupiscence totally away. If then we wish divine life to develop greatly in our souls, we must labour unceasingly to diminish these remnants of sin, to weaken these evil roots, that disfigure our soul in God’s sight.

Besides the action of the sacrament of penance, an efficacious means exists for removing those scars of sin that prevent God from communicating His life to us in abundance.

This means is the virtue of penance. It is a habit which, when deeply implanted, constantly inclines us to the expiation of sin, and the destruction of what remains of it. This virtue must doubtless, as we are about to see, manifest itself by acts proper to it; but it is above all an habitual attitude of the soul — an abiding regret for having offended God and desire to make reparation for our faults. This habitual sentiment ought to inspire our acts of penance.

By these acts, man rises up against himself to avenge God’s rights which he has trampled under foot. By his sins, he rose up against God, he opposed his will to the all-

Christo Jesu qui pro peccatis nostris satisfecit, ex quo omnis sufficientia nostra est, conformes efficimur, certissimam quoque inde arrham habentes, quod si compatimur et conglorificabimur. NEQUE VERO ITA EST SATISFACTIO HAEC, QUAM PRO PECCATIS NOSTRIS EXSOLVIMUS, UT NON SIT PER CHRISTUM JesuM ; nam qui ex nobis tamquam ex nobis nihil possumus, eo coopevante, qui nos confortat, omnia possumus. Ita non habet homo unde glorietur; sed omnis gloriatio nostra in Christo est,in quo vivimus,in quo movemuy, IN QUO SATISFACIMUS, facientes fructus dignos poenitentiae, QUI EX ILLO VIM HABENT, AB ILLO OFFERUNTUR PATRI, ET PER ILLUM ACCEPTANTUR A Patre. " Concil. Trid. Sess. xtv, cap. 8. holy will of God; by his acts of penance he unites himself to God in His hatred of sin and to His justice that demands the expiation of it. The soul then sees sin by faith through the eyes of God. ” I have sinned”, it says, ” I have committed an act of which I cannot measure all the malice, but that is so terrible, and so much violates God’s rights, His justice, His holiness and love, that only the death of the Man-God could expiate it”. Then moved with sorrow, the soul says to God: ” O my God, I detest my sin, I long to avenge Thy tights by penance, I would rather die than offend Thee again ”. That is the spirit of penance that urges and inclines the soul to make acts of expiation.

You will understand that this attitude of soul is necessary for all who have not lived in perfect innocence. When the motive is fear of hell, it is good, says the Council of Trent 7; God accepts it. But when the motive is love, it is excellent and perfect; the more the love of God increases within us, the more we feel the need of offering to God the sacrifice of ”a contrite and humbled heart”: Cor contritum et humiliatum Deus non despicies?; the more we feel the need of often saying to Him with the publican in the Gospel: ”O God, be merciful to me, a sinner ?”.

When this feeling of compunction is habitual, it maintains the soul in great peace; it keeps it in humility: it becomes too, a powerful instrument of purification. Compunction helps us to mortify those ill-regulated instincts, those perverse tendencies that might lead us into fresh faults. One who has this virtue, is careful to use all the means to be met with so as to make reparation for sin +.

The virtue of penance is, as regards ourselves, the greatest assurance of perseverance in the way of perfection, because it is, as we can easily see, one of the purest forms of love. One loves God so much, regrets so profoundly having offended Him, that one longs to repair and expiate: this is the source of a life of generosity and self-forgetfulness. ” Holiness”, says Father Faber,” has lost its principle of growth if it is separated from abiding sorrow for sin. For the principle of growth is not love only, but forgiven love *”.

  1. Sess. xIv, cap. 4. — 2. Ps. L, 19. — 3. Luc. xvii, 13. — 4. In another series of conferences, we will treat more at length of the importance of compunction in order to progress in the hidden life. — 5. Growth in Holiness, ch. x1x.

Certain souls, even pious souls, feel sometimes a certain sense of repulsion in hearing the word penance; it is the same with that of mortification which expresses the same idea. Whence does this feeling of repulsion come? It ought not to astonish us, for it has a psychological foundation.

Our will necessarily seeks good in general, and happiness, or that which seems to us to be such. Now mortification which refrains certain of our sensible tendencies, certain of our most natural desires, appears to these souls as opposed to happiness : therefore arises this repugnance towards all that constitutes the practice of self-renunciation.

Moreover, we too often see in mortification an end in itself, when we only ought to see in it a means, necessary certainly, even indispensable, but a means all the same. We do not detract from Christianity in considering self-renunciation only as a means.

Christianity is a mystery of death and of life,but the object of this death is to safeguard the divine life in us. Non est Deus mortuorum sed viventium’. ” (Christ), by dying destroyed our death, and by rising again restored our life”: Mortem nostram moriendo destruxit et vitam resurgendo reparavit?. The essential work of Christianity, as well as the final end to which of its nature it tends, is a work of life; Christianity is the reproduction of the life of Christ in the soul.

Now, as I have said, Christ’s life on earth can be summed up in this double aspect: ” He was delivered up for our sins, and rose again for our justification”: Traditus est propter delicta nostra et resurrexit propter justificationem nostram *. The Christian dies to all that is sin, the better to live the life of God. Penance then serves primarily as the means of arriving at this aim.

That is what St. Paul so clearly expressed: ” Always bearing about in our body the mortification of Jesus, that the life also of Jesus may be made manifest in our bodies *”. It must be our aim — there is no other — that the life of Christ which has its principle in grace and its perfection in love, may shine forth in us : that is the end ; there is none other. To attain this end, mortification is necessary. St. Paul says: ” They that are Christ’s — and we belong to8

Christ by our baptism — ” have crucified their flesh, with the vices and concupiscences”, Qui sunt Christi, crucifixeruni carnem suam cum vitus et concupiscentiis suist. And again he says still more explicitly: ” If you live according to the flesh, you shall die; but if by the Spirit, you mortify the deeds of the flesh, you shall live?”, live the Divine life.

IV

Let us see more in detail why and how we must ” die” so as ”to live”; why and how we must, as Our Lord said Himself, ” lose” ourselves so that we may save ourselves °.

God created the first man in rectitude: Deus fecit hominem rectum*. In Adam, the senses were entirely under the dominion of the reason and the reason was perfectly subject to God. Since Adam’s sin, this harmonious order has disappeared, the inferior appetite has become rebellious, and the flesh strives against the spirit. ” Unhappy man that I am...” cries St. Paul, “the good which I will I do not, but the evil which I will not, that I do ®”. It is concupiscence, the prompting of the inferior appetite, that inclines us to disorder and urges us to sin. Now this ” concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life°” ever tends to increase, to bear fruits of sin and supernatural death. Hence, in order that the life of grace may be maintained and developed in us it is needful to mortify, that is to say, reduce so as to render powerless, ” put to death ”, not our nature itself, but that which in our nature is the source of disorder and sin: — the ill-regulated instincts of the senses, the wandering of the imagination, perverse inclinations. The reason of the primary necessity for penance is to re-establish order in us and restore to reason, itself being subject to God, the dominion over the inferior powers, so as to allow the will to yield entirely to God. That is life. Never forget this: Christianity demands mortification first of all so as to immolate in us that which is opposed to life. The Christian labours, by self-renunciation, to root out from the soul all element of spiritual death, so that the divine life may increase in it with more liberty, ease and fulness.9

From this point of view, mortification is a rigorous consequence of our baptism, of our Christian initiation. St. Paul tells us that the neophyte on being plunged into the sacred font, there dies to sin and begins to live for God : this double formula as we have seen sums up all Christian conduct. We cannot be Christians unless we first reproduce Christ’s death in ourselves, by renouncing sin: Ita et vos existimate, vos mortuos esse peccato.

You may perhaps ask in what does this death to sin consist, how far does it extend, and how are we to apply this law of renunciation in ourselves 7?

Of course the application of this law can be varied almost indefinitely. The state of soul is not the same for everyone, and the stages that the same soul passes through are many.

St. Gregory the Great? lays down the principle that the more the supernatural order has been disturbed by the predominance of the inferior appetite, the longer the work of renunciation must last. In souls where sin has taken deep root, the sources of spiritual disorder are more active, the life of grace more liable to be lost ; for such as these, mortification ought to be more vigilant, more vigorous, more continuous. In other souls, for example, those that are no longer at the beginning of the spiritual life, the roots of sin are lessened and weakened; grace finds a more generous and fruitful soil; for them the necessity of penance, in so far as it has for its end to cause death to sin, will be less imperious, the obligation of renunciation less extensive. But for these faithful souls in which grace abounds, there arises another motive which we will touch on later — the motive of more closely resembling Christ, our Chief, the Head of the mystical body of which all the members are bound together by the law of solidarity. And the field that opens out before these souls is boundless.

That is a general principle, but whatever be the measure of its application, there are obligations every Christian must fulfil: the exact keeping of God’s commandments, of the precepts of the Church (the observance of Lent, the Vigils and Ember days) ; the daily fidelity to the duties of one’s state, to the law of labour; watchfulness to constantly shun the many occasions of sin; all this often involves acts of renunciation, and sacrifices costly to nature.10

There is next the struggle against the special defects that may beset and weaken the divine life. In one, it is self-love; in another, levity of mind; in this one, jealousy or anger; in that one, sensuality or sloth. These defects, if not resisted, are the occasion of a thousand sins and voluntary infidelities that hinder God’s action in us. However little these vices may be apparent, Our Lord expects of us that we should take the trouble to see them, and that we should labour generously by constant watchfulness over ourselves, by the careful examination of our daily actions, and by corporal mortification as well as by interior self denial, to extirpate them. He expects us to take no respite until the roots of these vices are so weakened that they can no longer spring up and bear fruit. For the more these roots decrease, the more the divine life grows strong within us, because it has great liberty to unfold.

Lastly, there are the renunciations that, under the guidance of Providence,me wust expect in the course of life,and accept as true disciples of Christ Jesus: there are sickness and suffering; the loss of those dear to us, adversities, the oppositions and contradictions that thwart the realisation of our plans; the failure of our undertakings; our disillusionments; moments of weariness, hours of sadness, the burden of the day that weighed so heavenly on St. Paul? till, as he says himself, he was weary even of life: Ut etiam taederet vsvere *, — all those miseries that detach us from ourselves and creatures by mortifying our nature and making it die in us little by little: Quotidie morior 3.

Ate

“J die daily”. Those are St. Paul’s words; but if he died daily, it was that he might the better live the life of Christ.

And in speaking of his sufferings, he wrote those words that appear so strange and are of such profound depth: ” I... fill up those things that are wanting of the sufferings of re Rom. 3%, 2.,— 2. Il Cor; 1) 8: =4: I Cor. xv, 31.

Christ, in my flesh, for His (mystical) body, which is the Church”. Is there then something wanting to the sufferings, to the satisfactions of Christ? Certainly not. Their value is infinite. Christ’s sufferings are the sufferings of the Man God Who substituted Himself for us. Nothing is wanting to the perfection and plenitude of these sufferings; they were more than sufficient to redeem us all. IPSE est propitiatio pro peccatis TOTIUS mundi*. Then why does St. Paul speak of ” filling up ” these sufferings ?

St. Augustine gives us the reply. The whole Christ, he says, is formed by the Church unitedtoher Chief, and by the members, (which we are), united to the Head, (which is Christ). Christ, the Head of this mystical body, has suffered; the great expiation was that of Jesus; the members, if they wish to remain worthy of the Head, must in their turn bring their share of suffering and renunciation: Jmpletae erant omnes passiones, sed in capite restabant adhuc CHRISTI PASSIONES IN CORPORE; vos autem estis corpus et memobra *.

Contemplate Christ Jesus on His way to Calvary, laden with His cross; He falls under the weight of this burden. If He willed, His divinity would sustain His humanity; but He does not will it. Why? Because, in order to expiate sin, He wills to feel in His innocent flesh the burden of sin. But the Jews fear He will not live to reach the place of cruciixion; they therefore constrain Simon the Cyrenean to help to carry His cross, and Jesus accepts his help.

Simon, in this, represents us all; as members of Christ’s mystical body, we must help Jesus to bear His cross. It is a sure sign we belong to Him, if, following Him, we deny ourselves and take up our cross: Qui vult venire post me, abneget semetipsum, et tollat crucem suam, et sequatur me *. Here is to be found the secret of the voluntary mortifications of faithful souls, privileged souls, holy souls — those mortifications that afflict and macerate the body as well as those that repress even the lawful desires of the mind. Such souls have doubtless expiated their own sins, but love constrains them to expiate for those members of Christ’s bedy who offend their Chief so that the vigour, beauty and splendour of this mystical body may not be diminished. If we truly love Christ, we shall, following the counsel of a prudent director, generously take our share of these voluntary mortifications which will make us less unworthy members of a crucified Head. Was it not this that St. Paul sought ? Did he not write that he had suffered the loss of all things so that he might be admitted to the fellowship of Christ’s sufferings and be made conformable to His death ? Ad cognoscendum illum et societatem passionum ilius, configuratus morti ejus?.11

If our nature feels some repulsion, let us ask Our Lord to give us the strength to imitate Him by following Him even to Calvary. According to the beautiful thought of St. Augustine, the innocent Christ, like a compassionate physician, reserved for Himself the dregs of the chalice of suffering and renunciation of which we have only to drink a few drops: Sanari non potes nisi amarum calicem biberis; prior bibit medicus sanus, ut bibere non dubitaret aegrotus?. For, says St. Paul, Christ knows, by experience, what sacrifice is. ” We have not a high priest Who cannot have compassion on our infirmities, but one tempted in all things like as we are yet without sin*”.

I have said to what an extent Our Lord has shared our sufferings, but never let us forget that in thus sharing our sorrows and such of our miseries as were compatible with His divinity, Christ has sanctified our sufferings, our infirmities, our expiations. He has merited for us that we may have the strength to bear them in our turn and that they may be accepted by His Father. But for this to be effected, we must unite ourselves to Our Lord by faith and love, and consent to carry our cross after Him. It is from this union that our sufferings and sacrifices derive their value; of themselves they have no value for heaven, but, when joined to those of Christ, they become extremely pleasing to God and salutary for our souls *.

This union of our will with Our Lord in suffering also becomes for us a source of solace.

When we suffer, when we are in pain, in sadness, in weariness, in adversity or difficulties, and we come to Jesus we are not delivered from our cross, for ” the disciple is not t. Philipp. m, 8, 10. — 2. De verbis Domini. Serm. xvi, c. 7 and 8. above his master!”, but we are comforted. Christ Himself has told us that He wills us to take up our cross; it is the indispensable condition for becoming His true disciple, — but He promises too that He will refresh those who come to find in Him a balm for their sufferings. And He Himself invites us: ” Come to Me, all you that labour, and are burdened, and I will refresh you?”. His words are infallible. If you go to Him with confidence, be assured He will turn tenderly towards you because, according to the words the Gospel applied to Him, He will be touched with compassion: Misericordia motus*. Was He not crushed under suffering to the point of crying out: ” Father, let this chalice of bitterness pass from Me”? St. Paul expressly tells us that one of the reasons Christ wished to endure sorrow was that He might succour those who would come to Him*. He is the Good Samaritan Who bends over suffering humanity and brings to it, with salvation, the consolation of the Spirit of Love. It is from Him all true consolation is born for our souls. St. Paul repeats to us: ” As the sufferings of Christ abound in us, so also by Christ doth our comfort abound >”. You see how he identifies his tribulations with those of Jesus, since he is a member of Christ’s mystical body, and how also it is from Christ he receives consolation.12

And how these words are verified in him! How great is the part he takes in Christ’s sorrows !...See the vivid picture the apostle draws of the many difficulties that assailed him during his apostolic journeys when he often saw death near to him: ” Five times did I receive forty stripes, save one; thrice was I beaten with rods, once was I stoned, thrice I suffered shipwreck, a night and a day I was in the depth of the sea. In journeyings often, in perils of waters, in perils of robbers, in perils from my own nation, in perils from the Gentiles, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils from false brethren, in labour and painfulness, in much watchings, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness, besides those things which are without, my daily instance and solicitude for all the churches... °”.

What a picture !... How the soul of the great apostle must have been wearied with so many miseries, ever recurring !

  1. Luc. vi, 40. — 2. Matth. x, 28. — 3. Luc. vn, 13. —4. Hebr. rv, 15 and u, 16-8; Debuit fratribus similari ut misericors fieret. — 5. II Cor. 1, Sera, “1 Aone ays:

And yet in all these tribulations, he ” exceedinly abounded with joy: ” SUPERABUNDO GAUDIO in omni tribulatione nostra*. What is the secret of this joy ? It is the love he bears towards Christ delivered up for him: Caritas Christi urget nos. It is through Christ his consolation abounds: J ta, et per Christum, ABUNDAT consolatio nostra?. Because he is one with Christ through love of Him, he remains unshaken in the midst of all the miseries and hardships to which he is subjected. ” Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation? or distress? or famine? or nakedness? or danger? or persecution? or the sword? As it is written: For Thy sake we are put to death all the day long. We are accounted as sheep for the slaughter”. But, he adds: ” in all these things we overcome because of Him that hath loved us 3 we

Such is the cry of one who understood the immense love of Christ Crucified, and as a true disciple, wished to walk in His footsteps even as far as Calvary, by taking, out of love, his part in the Divine Mastex’s sufferings *. For as I have said, it is from Calvary, it is from the Passion of Christ Jesus, that our sufferings, our acts of renunciation and mortification derive all their supernatural value to destroy sin and allow the divine life to unfold within us. We must unite them in our intention to the Sacrament of Penance, which applies to us the merits of Christ’s sufferings that they may make us die to sin. If we do this, the efficacy of the Sacrament of Penance will extend, as it were, to every act of the virtue of penance to increase its fruitfulness.

VI

Moreover, that is indeed the intention of the Church. After the priest, Christ’s minister, has imposed the necessary satisfaction, and, by absolution, has washed our souls in the Divine Blood, he repeats these words over us: ” May whatever of good thou dost, and evil thou bearest, be to thee for the remission of thy sins, the increase of grace, and the reward of everlasting life®”. This prayer is not essential to the sacrament, but as it has been ordained by the Church,

  1. If Cor. vi, 4. — 2. Ibid. v, 14. — 3. Ibid. 1, 5- —4. Rom. Witt, 35.

— §- Quidquid boni feceris et mali sustinueris sit tibi in remissionem peccatorum, augmentum gratiae et praemium vitae aeternae, besides containing teaching that the Church assuredly desires to see us put into practice, it has the value of a sacramental.

By this prayer, the priest gives to our sufferings, to our acts of satisfaction, of expiation, of mortification, of reparation and patience which he thus links and unites with the sacrament, a special efficacy which our faith should not neglect to consider.

” For the remission of thy sins”. — The Council of Trent teaches on this subject a very consoling truth. It tells us that God is so munificent in His mercy that, not only the works of expiation that the priest imposes on us, or that we ourselves choose, but even all the sufferings inherent to our condition here below, all the temporal adversities which God sends or permits and we patiently support, serve, through Christ’s merits, as satisfaction with the Eternal Father’. That is why — I cannot too often recommend it to you — it is an excellent and most fruitful practice when we present ourselves to the priest, or rather to Jesus Christ, in order to accuse ourselves of our sins, to accept in expiation all the pains, all the annoyances, all the contradictions which may befall us ; and still more, to resolve at this moment on such or such special act of mortification, however light it may be, which we will accomplish until our next confession.

Fidelity to this practice, which enters so well into the spirit of the Church, is very profitable. To begin with, it removes the danger of routine. A soul that, by faith, thus plunges itself again into the consideration of the greatness of this sacrament in which the Blood of Jesus is applied to us, and with an intention full of love, offers to bear patiently, in union with Christ on the Cross, all that happens that is hard, difficult, painful or disappointing in life, such a soul is impervious to the rust which with many persons accompanies frequent confession. Secondly, this practice is an act of love extremely pleasing to Our Lord because it is a mark of our willingness to share the sufferings of His Passion, the most holy of His myteries. Finally, being

  1. Docet praeterea sancta synodus tantam esse diviiae munificentiae largitatem wt non solum poenis sponte a nobis pro vindicando peccato susceptis, aut sacerdotis arbitrio pro mensura delicti impositis, sed etiam (quod maximum amoris argumentum est) temporalibus flagellis a Deo inflictis et a nobis patienter toleratis, apud Deum Patrem, per Jesum Christum, satisfacere valeamus. Sess. XIv, cap. 9.

THE SACRAMENT AND THE VIRTUE OF PENANCE. 209 frequently renewed, it helps us to acquire little by little that true spirit of penance, so necessary in order to become like to Jesus, our Head and our Model.

After saying: ” May whatever good thou dost and evil thou bearest be to thee for the remission of thy sins”, the priest adds: ” and the increase of grace”, Augmentum gratiae. J have said that death is here the prelude of life. Our Lord Himself says that the grain of wheat must first die in the ground before it can germinate and bring forth the fruit of the harvest which the householder will gather into his barns?. This life will become so much the more fruitful, grace willso much the more abound, in proportion as abnegation has reduced, weakened and diminished the obstacles opposed to its free growth. For, always remember this important truth, holiness is for us of an essentially supernatural order, and God is its source; the more our souls, by means of mortification, free themselves from sin and are detached from self and creatures, the more the Divine action is powerful within us. Christ tells us so; He even tells us that His Father makes use of suffering to render the life of the soul more fruitful: ’” I am the Vine, and My Father is the Husbandman; you are the branches. Every branch that beareth fruit, My Father will purge that it may bring forth more fruit. In this is My Father glorified, that you bring forth very much fruit”. Omnem palmitem qui fert fructum purgabit eum ut fructum plus afferat. In hoc clarificatus est Pater meus ut fructum plurimum afferatis ?. When the Eternal Father sees that a soul, already united to His Son, by grace, resolutely desires to give herself fully to Christ, He wills to make life abound in her and to increase her capacity for receiving it. To do this, He Himself enters into this work of renunciation and detachment, because that is the preliminary condition of our fruitfulness. He prunes away all that could prevent the life of Christ from producing its full effects; all that is an obstacle to the Divine sap. Our corrupt nature contains roots that tend to produce evil fruits ; by the repeated and deep sufferings He permits or sends, by humiliations and contradictions, God purifies us, digs and ploughs up the ground of our souls, as it were, detaches us from creatures, and empties us of self that we

  1. Joan. xm, 24. — 2. Ibid. xv, 1-8.

Christ, the life of the soul, 14 may produce numerous fruits of life and holiness; Purgabit eum ut fructum plus afferat.

Finally, the priest says: Et praemium vitae aeternae, ” May all these things be to thee for the reward of everlasting life”. After having restored order here below so that the life of Christ may grow and increase within us, our sufferings, our acts of expiation, our efforts to do good, assure to our souls a share in heavenly glory. Recall to your minds the conversation of the two disciples on the way to Emmaus on the morrow of the Passion. Dismayed by the death of the Divine Master, which seemingly put an end to their hopes of the reign of the Messias, and being yet ignorant of the resurrection of Jesus, they confide their deep disappointment to one another. Christ comes up to them under the guise of a stranger, and asks them the subject of their discourse. And after having listened to the expression of their disillusionment, Sperabamus. ” We hoped...” ”O foolish and slow of heart to believe”! He immediately says in reproach, ” ought not Christ to have suffered these things and so to enter into His glory”? Nonne haec oportut pati Christum, ET ITA intrare in gloriam suam+? It is the same for us; we must share in Christ’s sufferings if we are to share in His glory.

This glory and beatitude will be immense. ” For which cause we faint not”, writes St. Paul; ” but though our outward man is corrupted, yet the inward man is renewed day by day, for that which is at present momentary and light of our tribulation, worketh for us above measure exceedingly an eternal weight of glory”. Jd enim quod in praesenti est momentaneum et leve tribulationis nostrae, supra modum in sublimitate aeternum gloriae pondus operatur in nobis*. He writes again: ” And if sons, heirs also; heirs indeed of God and joint heirs with Christ; yet so, if we suffer with Him, that we may be also glorified with Him”, and he adds: ” For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory to come, that shall be revealed in us*”. Therefore in the same measure in

  1. Luc. xxiv, 26. St. Paul echoed this saying of the Divine Master when he wrote to the Hebrews (11, 9) : Vidermus Jesum PROPTER passionem mor- which ” you partake of the sufferings of Christ, rejoice that when His glory shall be revealed, you may also be glad with exceeding joy”. Communicantes Christi passionibus, gaudete, ut et in revelatione gloriae ejus gaudeatis exsultantes 2.13

Courage then !_ I repeat with S. Paul. ”“Know you not”, he says, in allusion to the public games, the races in the arena, that took place in his time, “know you not that everyone that striveth for the mastery, refraineth himself from all things ” so as to bear off the prize. And what was the prize? A crown of a day, while it is for an imperishable crown that we deny ourselves?, and this crown is to share for ever in the glory and beatitude of our Head.

Jesus Christ says: Here below you are in affliction; the world that knows Me not lives in pleasure, while, by a life of faith, you bear with Me the burden of the Cross; but I will see you again at the last day, ’and your heart shall rejoice; and your joy no man shall take from you”. — Plorabitis et flebitis vos, mundus autem gaudebit; vos autem contristabiminti, sed tristitia vestra convertetur in gaudium... Iterum widebo vos et gaudebit cor vestrum, — ET GAUDIUM VESTRUM NEMO TOLLET A VOBIS *.

  1. I Petr. 1v, 13. — 2. I Cor. 1x, 24-25. — 3. Joan. xvi, 20-22.

Footnotes

    1. Rom. vi, 6. — 2. Sess. XIV, cap. 1.
    ↩

  2. 1, Sess. vi, can, 22. — 2. Ps. cn, 13. — 3. Ibid. 14. — 4. Matth. XVII, 22. — 5. Ps. LXxxvill, 2. — 6. Apoc. v, 9. ↩

  3. 1.Contritio animi dolor ac detestatio est de peccato commisso, cum proposito non peccandi de caetero. Concil. Trid. Sess. xIv, cap. 4. ↩

    1. Ps. xtiv. 8. — 2. Apoc. 1. 5. — 3. Isa. Lil, rr. — 4. Gal. m1, 20; cf, Ephes. v, 2.
    ↩
    1. Philipp. 11, 7-9. — 2. Joan. xn, 5. — 3. ees WJ, 10-11. — 4. Matth. XxXvi, 18. — 5. Joan. v, 22. — 6. Ibid
    ↩
    1. Marc. xm, 26. — 2. Sane vero res et effectus hujus sacrament, quantum ad ejus vim et efficaciam pertinet, reconciliatio est cum Deo,
    ↩

  7. to. Isaset, 13. — 2, Ibid. xiv, 225 — 3. Sess. XIV, cap. 8. —- 4. Let us quote this very beautiful text: Dum satisfaciendo patimur pro peccatis. ↩

    1. Matth. xxu, 32. — 2. Preface of the Mass for Easter. — 3. Rom. Iv, 25. — 4. II Cor. iv, 10.
    ↩
    1. Gal. v, 24. — 2. Rom. vim, 13. — 3. Joan, xi, 25. — 4. Eccl. vu, 30. — 5. Rom. vu, 19-24. — 6. I Joan. m1, 16.
    ↩
    1. Homil. XX in Evang. c. 8. See also Reg. pastor. P. mm, c. 29.
    ↩
    1. Col. 1, 24, — 2. I Joan. 1, 2. — 3. Enarrat. in Ps. txxxvny, c. 5. — 4. Lué. IX, 23.
    ↩

  12. — 3- Hebr. rv, 15. — 4. See the text of the Council of Trent given above, pp. 197-198. ↩

  13. tis gloria et honore coronatum. Cf. Philipp. u, 7-9. — 2. II Cor. tv, 17. — 3. Rom. vin, 17-18. ↩

Chapter 12 of 21