![\"Worst](\"https:\/\/www.orthodoxytoday.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/06\/St_Mark_Basilica_Venice_01_250px.jpg\" "\\"St_Mark_Basilica_Venice_01_250px\\"")
by James V. Schall, S.J. –
\nWhen asked why he entered the Church, Chesterton, in a famous passage, replied: \u201cTo get rid of my sins.\u201d The New Testament also makes it clear that this riddance of sins is the central purpose of redemption. Christ did not come so much to define what sins were \u2013 we have to be pretty obtuse not to have an inkling of what they are \u2013 but to forgive them.<\/p>\n
He claimed this power, which was indeed a divine power. That claim scandalized the Jewish leaders who heard Him. But He was firm in His purpose. He proceeded to give His apostles in the Church power to continue this central purpose, but only in His name.<\/p>\n
Christ\u2019s coming, then, is a relief that we finally have some authentic way to get rid of our sins. The presumption is that we want to do so because we know the burden they impose on each of us. The \u201cthou shalt not\u2019s\u201d of the commandments are pretty basic. <\/p>\n
Chesterton also remarked that we are given these basic admonitions about what we should not do so that we would be free to do what we wanted to do if we did not have the burden of our sins.<\/p>\n
Sin, even if we insist on calling it a good, which surprisingly many do these days, prevents us from doing what we want, from reaching the good we seek. Indeed, even in sinning, we seek a good, only we freely put it out of order.<\/p>\n
We should never be overly surprised that people of all sorts, including ourselves, sin. Saddened perhaps, but not surprised. The Church exists that sins be forgiven within her. It restores one\u2019s direct relation to God that is broken when we sin.<\/p>\n
The Church\u2019s worst persecutors have been her own unfaithful bishops, priests, and religious. Opposition from outside is terrible; it gives us many martyrs. But the Church\u2019s worst enemy is her own traitors.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
Christ never said that somewhere down the line He or someone else would figure out a way to prevent sinning. He gave us free will. The only way to eradicate sin would be to eradicate free will. \u201cThere can be collapses and repeated ruptures,\u201d Joseph Ratzinger said in Salt of the Earth<\/em>, \u201cbecause redemption is always entrusted to the freedom of man, and God will never annul this freedom\u201d The denial of sin, whatever sophisticated form it takes, is simply a lie.<\/p>\n So sinners are not the most dangerous thing in the Church. They are why the Church exists in the form that it does. It is sometimes said that, because we know we can be forgiven, we can sin freely. Christ Himself was pretty generous in the number of times we should forgive, but He was not encouraging the sinning.<\/p>\n A real issue does exist, however, that is associated with such considerations. The Church can surely be said to have \u201cenemies,\u201d those who restrict her in every way, who set up other religious or ideological systems to replace or counteract her.<\/p>\n Many countries in the world, more than we suspect, including our own, have laws or decrees that exclude or restrict the freedom to practice or explain the faith. Such restrictions are quite unjust. They reveal some aspect of the mystery of iniquity, the mystery of the hatred of the good, of God.<\/p>\n Somewhere back in the 1930s, during the Spanish Civil War, and facing other issues in Germany and Italy, Pius XI asked this very question: \u201cWho are the Church\u2019s most dangerous enemies?\u201d His answer was as follows:<\/p>\n The Church\u2019s worst persecutors have been her own unfaithful bishops, priests, and religious. Opposition from outside is terrible; it gives us many martyrs. But the Church\u2019s worst enemy is her own traitors.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Why is this, we wonder? The mission of the Church ad extra<\/em> has much to do with the witness to the truth by Christians themselves, especially those in high places, both clergy and laity.<\/p>\n In an analogous manner, John Paul II remarked to European bishops in 1982 that \u201cthe crises of European man and of Europe are crises and temptations of Christianity and of the Church in Europe.\u201d We are wont to think that the drama of the world takes place outside of the redemptive plan of God. It doesn\u2019t.<\/p>\n the greatest evil we can do is to call what is evil good and what is good evil.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n C. S. Lewis remarked, in Mere Christianity, <\/em>I think, that the greatest evil we can do is to call what is evil good and what is good evil.\u00a0It does not matter whether this calling is shrouded in the form of relativism, diversity theory, or the will to power. The effect is the same.<\/p>\n In the end, we now call, by various sophisticated names, what is evil good. We make laws to justify this reversal of good and evil, which, as such, do not change. We penalize those who hold that the \u201cthou shalt not\u2019s\u201d are correct.<\/p>\n But the key point remains: the \u201cenablers\u201d who justify and make evil possible by their own disordered souls. Repentance remains the only way to stop this reversal, repentance and, as Benedict says, judgment.<\/p>\n HT: The Catholic Thing<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" by James V. Schall, S.J. – When asked why he entered the Church, Chesterton, in a famous passage, replied: \u201cTo get rid of my sins.\u201d The New Testament also makes it clear that this riddance of sins is the central purpose of redemption. Christ did not come so much to define what sins were \u2013 … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":497,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"generate_page_header":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[149,113,68,35],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7885","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-apologetics","category-christian-persecution","category-christianity","category-philosophy"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.orthodoxytoday.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7885","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.orthodoxytoday.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.orthodoxytoday.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.orthodoxytoday.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/497"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.orthodoxytoday.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7885"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.orthodoxytoday.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7885\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.orthodoxytoday.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7885"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.orthodoxytoday.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7885"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.orthodoxytoday.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7885"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}James V. Schall, S.J.<\/strong>, a professor at Georgetown University, is one of the most prolific Catholic writers in America. His most recent books are<\/em>\u00a0The Mind That Is Catholic<\/a> and<\/em> The Modern Age<\/a>.<\/div>\n