A. Back ground: This is 11th ordinary sunday. Out of these 11 sundays, we spend 4 sundays, to analyze the CONCEPT DEFINING FEATURES of Catholicism.
These are
(1) God has Given one life(no another birth with babyhood), for you to lead a happy life, With surrendering your will to His. How to develop a happy mind? With Pardoning process, and receiving Eucharist, you achieve peaceful mind. Then next step is to develop worry less mind, by handing over your worries to Mary/Saints, then you develop your health and carry out actions efficiently.
(2)When you go against catholic 7 ethics,it is sin, you can remove the guilt of the sin, by REPENTANCE and confession. You can remove the punishment for sin, by indulgence activities. Punishment for sin can be during your life or after death in Purgatory. The equation only God knows,about punishment is in the hands of God. The process has been developed by Father/Son and Holy Spirit is Repentance,Confession and Indulgence.
(3) Holy Spirit lead church, through Pope's infallibility. With a happy mind, convert your talents to energy, by making to many skills,then to knowledge,by hard work, you develop to good attitude.
These features will identify what is catholicism. Since all religions, say, you have to love,avoid sins and they give a process to erase the effects of sin, you will see some overlapping concepts(not all), With Catholicism to other religions.
HAVING UNDERSTOOD CLEARLY WHAT ARE THE CONCEPTS defining features OF CATHOLISM, you can follow the other,reflections given in ordinary times sundays. Up to now 6 ordinary Sundays,out of 10 already passed.
First 5 has been devoted' HOW TO BE A CATHOLIC PROFESSIONAL"?. A professional means, who,does things even when he is not feeling to do so, and not blown about winds of moments. He stay focused to a success of his mission and do difficult things.
Professional will practice professional Ethics
You know what are your Catholic Ethics to follow!. When you are following certain Ethics, you will not go in a popular path. For example.
Jesus clearly show us how to become. Catholic Professional, He said NO
{(1)to ambitious young man to follow HIM
(2)to HIS mother,when She interrupt HIS teaching
(3)to Judas,turning into politics
(4)to temptation in wilderness
(5) at times,to HIMSELF"NO,I will not run from this. I will drink the cup that is placed before to me"
In practical Catholism,
You start to become Professional,after CONFIRMATION.
Training under professional is needed for you To become full professional.
Your Godparents or parents/priests..
have trained you,after Baptism/confirmation! For you to become a full professional.
Last sunday the 10th of ordinary times, two important points were reminded,
I.e (1)the value of respecting your parents, specially looking after them when they are help less in life.
(2) How you die spiritually due to sin and how you remove the guilt of the sin, thru' REPENTENT and CONFESSION with a priest and become grace With God! and nourish with Holy Eucharist.
Today, the 11th Sunday, church invites us to reflect more on REPENTANCE. This is the very primary step of Pardoning process. Whole hearted Repentance, also you have to develop, like your attitudes.
C. Preamble to days reading:
B.1 Forgiveness of sin
- is what to day's liturgy is all about. Both David and the nameless women in Gospel were sinners. They have forgotten God and given into shameful self-indulgence. Why did they repent? BECAUSE GOD REFUSED TO FORGET THEM. God went after them,tracked them down,as a shepard tracks down lost sheep.
David came to his sense and repented and God forgives him. We don't know how the woman recognized her sinful condition and repented.
Her actions tell to the world, especially to Jesus, how she feels about her sinful past.
The Pharisee Simon, is the only one refuse to understand what has really happened."If this man is prophet,he would know who and what sort of woman this is that touches him. Jesus makes the Pharisee reluctantly admit that a person who receive the largest forgiveness of a debt has to be the most grateful. This gives another, point for us to understand. I.e. You should not brand anyone as Sinner. The judging will be done by God. HE can pardon any sins, hence we don't know whether the sinned person is actually in grace, after Pardoning or not. Next point is that, we cannot take the function of God. God is the ultimate judge. Let HIM judge whether the other person is n sin or not. We are not fit to judge.
Paul continues Jesus lesson: a person is not justified by legal observance or good work. The reason for God's acceptance and forgiveness is simply is God's living generosity and mercy. We can never have a claim on God. God has a claim on us, on our faith and gratitude and it is total.
B.2 Contrition
is guilt &sorry you feel for your actions against 7Ethics&church rules(sins). Sorry for sins MUST be genuine. Priests give everyone benefit of doubt,but no-one can fool God. PERFECT SORRY is when you are genuinely sorry as SINS OFFEND GOD. Imperfect Sorry is when you are sorry as you fear pains of hell. Church believes either sorry will do;but PERFECT is obviously better. When you visit the doctor,U should explain symptoms before he diagnose problem &prescribe remedy. CONFESSION is like a spiritual check-up. Priest is SPIRITUAL PHYSICIAN. Once U reveal your sins he will judge suitable penance(accd:Jn20:23).But only God judges if the person is truly sorry for his sins. Otherwise Sacrament will not work. You can FOOL PRIEST BUT NOT GOD. Effect of sin will increase fear/sorrow in life. God,thru' Catholic confession provides rehabilitation path for happy life.
B.3: Basic condition needed for Repentance:
First, you have to identify what is sin. For that you should know about 10 commandments and 7 vices.
B.3.1. 10 commandments
(1) Thou shalt have no other Gods before Me
(2) Thou shall not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain
(3) Keep holy the Sabbath Day
(4) Honour thy father and mother
(5) Thou shalt not kill (means only HUMANS)
(6) Thou shall not commit adultery
(7) Thou shall not steal
(8) Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor
(9) Thou shall not covert thy neighbor's wife
(10) Thou shalt not covert thy neighbors goods
Note: Obs: there are 3 parts, com 1- 5 God & you, com 6-8 deals personal to you, com 9-10 deals with you & society.
B.3.2. 7 vices
The wrong ways of enjoying has come to us from the original sin. At times due to lack of proper guidance,we get attached to things and persons alive or dead. Unless we purified we cannot purely love God with all our heart and all our soul.(Cf. Dt.6.5;Lk 10.27;Jn 15.12; Jn4.7-22)
Sloth: is laziness or idleness. Apart from doing nothing, you can develop idleness through unnecessary judging. This can be of 2 types. Discussing with your friends about bad about others- you go to unwanted areas of analysis, where you create not only spoiling your time but introducing anger in your body. Other type is unwarranted analysis about politicians or crimes in a given country. Analysis is good, but when you try to crave for analysis, you create spoiling your time without any results and start creating anger in your body. For this category of people, should avoid listening to multimedia, as first thing in the morning!.
Anger: is a strong feeling that comes when one feel, other is wrong or he is insulting or injustice etc. Anger is treated as committing suicide in catholicism.
SLOTH AND ANGER ARE VERY CLOSE FRIENDS, AND ALWAYS WE SHOULD AVOID THEM LIKE A WATER DROP TO A LOTUS FLOWER. HENCE, JUDGING OTHER IS A ROOT CAUSE TO GRASPH THESE 2 FRIENDS, WHICH WILL RUIN YOUR MENTAL HEATH AND ULTIMATELY PHYSICAL HEALTH TOO!.
Pride; it is too great an admiration of oneself. Pride has 7 evil consequences: boasting, love for publicity, hyprocrisy, hardheadness,discord,
Avarice: is lead us to be greedy,and ends up with fraud,perjury,dishonesty,
Envy; envy start demanding,"WHY SHOULD NOT I HAVE EVERY THING THAT OTHERS HAVE?". We are envious of another's goods and jealous of our own. DEEPLY ROUTED JEALOUSY CAN LEAD TO LOSE HEALTH BOTH PHYSICAL AND SPIRITUAL.
Lust; It is a dis orientated love that seeks not the other but personal individualistic pleasure and satisfaction in everything we do. Lust excludes all personal consideration for the sake of sensate experience. Lust leads to exploitation of oneself and others or things for our own glory, satisfaction and pleasure.
The pleasure seeking attitude in life cannot help us to partners with God. The desire for pleasure is good thing in life. Life would be sapless without it. What is dangerous is inordinate craving for it. Jesus advocate a life that is simple. He is conscious of the dangers of riches and money.
Gluttony:
This flows from the dis orderly animal appetite, the obsession with food and drink to the point of living to eat, rather than eating to live.
C. To days reading:
Samuel(2 S 12:7-10.13) Tells: prophet nathan lists david's sins; David response with sorrow & is forgiven.
Paul(Gal 2:16.19-21)" summarizes his doctrine on justification.
Lk7:36-8:3 tells" a sinful women repent her past & washes jesus feet with her tears. her sins are forgiven.
Reminds:
(1)In your life,you will sin either knowingly/know later
(2)perhaps when you get misery in your life,you tend to analyze whether you commit sins
3)Since you believe in 1 life,you can clearly identify you sins,analyze what cause you to make sin
(4)for that you should know primarily how to apply 10 commandments, in your life
(5)secondarily 7 vices
(6)Identify your sins, determine how to avoid in future &Repent that your action has caused,harm to your self+society+specially to God
(7) Go to a priest have confession. Frequent confession means often you test your life,the relationship with God. When did you confess?
E. Conclusions
In summary church, invites us to reflect today,very important character, that should develop in our life. REPENTANCE;
When you don't identify what is sin, you tend to amplify many sins, and tend to ignore/or appreciate about sins. Leading misery in your life. When a society leads without knowing repentance, will lead to, many corruption in the society! Catholicism will Provide you a clear path, how to develop your life, with repentance and confession!
And be happy in your life!
GBU
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