Sin as Damage--Pastoral Approach to Sin

(Preface--I do not generally like bold letters for emphasis, but I use them here in consideration of readers who have difficulty reading italics. So, if you see bold, imagine that it's italicized.)

I would like to begin with a preface that was written by St. John of the Cross; it is something that has always inspired me and guided me as I write. He begins,

"I shall trust neither to experience nor to knowledge, since both may fail and deceive; but, while not omitting to make such use as I can of these two things, I shall avail myself, in all that, with the Divine favour, I have to say, or at the least, in that which is most important and dark to the understanding, of Divine Scripture; for, if we guide ourselves by this, we shall be unable to stray, since He Who speaks therein is the Holy Spirit. And if aught I stray, whether through my imperfect understanding of that which is said in it or of matters uncollected with it, it is not my intention to depart from the sound sense and doctrine of our Holy Mother the Catholic Church; for in such a case I submit and resign myself wholly, not only to her command, but to whatever better judgment she may pronounce concerning it." (http://www.ccel.org/j/john_cross/ascent/book1.html)

This is a good principle for any Catholic writer to hold dear. It is a shame I do not today see it often.

Sin damages the sinner; it rends the soul; it deprives and starves the sinner, leaving him something of a corpse, like an undead thing. There are many ways of speaking about sin, and they are all valuable, but among the various models and schemas of sin, I believe that this one is one of the most important and the most neglected. Of course, it cannot stand on its own. By itself, it ignores the social dimension of sin (sin hurts the world; it attacks the Body of Christ; it rejects community), and the culpability dimension (sin is willful evil; it calls for judgement). First of all, these elements are not seperate, but merely distinguished. Second, I do not intend to ignore, supress, or belittle these latter two in any way. I only here prescind from them temporarily in order to speak of the first. Sin damages the sinner.

I maintain that this truth is neglected today. I do not say 'fought against'--few believers, or even dissenters, would have reason to disagree if the question was put to them--but the idea is merely pushed into the shadows. I suggest that this is partially due to a particular modernist tendency (one which is much talked about at my university) which is the bifurcation of the body and soul, as postulated by Rene Descartes. When we do this, as we so often are in the habit of doing, the implicit result is that our soul, and indeed, our will, is conceived as autonomous from our self. Thus, I suggest that often we conceive that we enter into sin and leave it as much the same person. Despite having incurred guilt/culpability, we do not imagine that our selves, who we are, is much changed. We are sinners before; we are sinners after; it is only a slight matter of degree. One more sin on the pile.

I am certain that this sort of thinking is common, and I have evidence: the drop in Confession attendance, the disappearance of 'indulgences', and a striking new popular strategy for attacking the doctrine of Purgatory, which I will come to later. I do not suggest, as others have, that people today have lost their sense of sin. As I see it, this sense is as strong as ever, but merely displaced. This leads to laxity in some areas, such as proper application of the sexual function, and intense scrupulousity in other areas, such as behavioral correction or the expression of personal beliefs. All of this is simply the result of poor Catholic education. I didn't learn that some things were forbidden until high school, or that others were permitted until college. In any case, guilt, as I understand it, is as high as ever, but it's more private than it once was because we've largely lost the Catholic frame of reference that permits and encourages Confession. Most importantly, we've lost the sense in which Confession is not just about 'putting things right between God and me', but about healing ourselves.

When I hit my brother, I shoot myself. When I laugh as a poor man, I tear at my skin. Every murder is a murder-suicide. I say that "An eye for an eye" is not merely an antiquated remnant of Hebrew law--it merely no longer normative. It is descriptive. And every week, before Confession, I am probably stumping around with a proverbial broken leg, 3rd degree burns, and a lost eye. "Unclean, unclean," I say to Christ the confessor, and he heals me. I contend that this goes much further than the 'guilt' effect of Sin. A woman who has had an abortion may discover, besides her guilt and her loss, if she has the courage to look, the leprousy of her soul. Only Christ can heal it.

However, since the awareness of this damage has been surpressed, many are in denial of the need for treatment. I discovered this in a conversation I had with a certain religious sister. Her case against Purgatory was quite simple: God's grace is too perfect to exclude sinners from Heaven, or to punish them in Purgatory. Further, she fancied that she had exetegical support (which indeed she did--she is a real exegete). If one is content to ignore the moral rigor of the Sermon on the Mount and quite a few other 'nagging details', it would appear that Jesus, in his acts and words, invited sin itself to dine with him at the everlasting banquet. He dined with "sinners and tax collectors," said that he came to call not "the righteous, but sinners," and told his inquirers, "tax collectors and prostitutes are entering the kingdom of God before you."

Of course, this is all terribly selective exegesis. I was even shocked to discover how scandalously selective a Christology professor of mine has been lately in trying to prove a point connected to these texts. He never mentioned the fact that my first two quotes, with versions in all four gospels, necessarily include statements that the sinners are in need of healing. The last quote, from Mt 21:31, explains the tax collectors and prostitutes' early entry into the Kingdom, which is because "When John came to you in the way of righteousness... the tax collectors and prostitutes... believe[d] him," implying, of course, that they repented.

This is all well and good, but the meat and potatoes of this digression is the idea of "God's perfect mercy". Now, lots of people here may have read Karl Keating's excellent response to the argument that "God's perfect mercy" negates the possibility of an eternal Hell. It was written in an order version of NewAdvent's "Catholic Faq" that I can no longer find. Anyway, Keating wrote that perfect mercy does not mean absolute mercy, but rather, mercy granted in a perfect way. This is an important distinction. With regard to Purgatory, it requires even more nuance, however: it is precisely because of God's mercy, and not in spite of it, that we will be purged of our sins in Purgatory. Ironically, this means that to negate purgatory is to negate God's healing, which implies a negation of his mercy. Without a purging of our sins, our bodies could not arise glorified at the end of time, because of the rending of our very selves occasioned by sin. How about that?

But let us go back to our main discussion. I have not even treated "pastoral approaches" yet. The idea of sin as damage is very important, pastorally. Unlike some very tolerantly-minded modern pundits today, I have no objection to a little fear and trembling in the confessional. Sometimes, especially with the most pernicious of my vices, I find that the dimension of guilt and culpability is the only one I will respond to. The difficulty comes when the confessor totalizes this dimension, or makes use of it in the wrong context; i.e., a repentant woman after an abortion. 'Sin as damage' is an important pastoral option, for the following reasons:

1.) It's very Biblical. No "watered-down," nicety-nice Christianity here--when Jesus dined with sinners, spoke with sinners, and touched sinners, he did so predominantly with the language of 'sin as damage' where he was their healer, and did not bludgeon them with guilt and culpability. The later language was mostly reserved to his moral preaching to groups of people. Context, context, context.

2.) It's a strong motivation for change. There is nothing wrong with the instinct for self-preservation. The fears of Hell are real, and they can motivate change--however, even for the simple faithful, Hell can appear distant, and the crackles of the embers reach us as empty echoes. The fear that we are already dead and broken by sin is more strong, more immanent, more _here and now_. It can motivate repentance and reform while contributing to a positive relationship with the confessor/spiritual director (as the healer, rather than as the cerebus guarding the infernal gate).

3.) It has the ability to revive regular and frequent Confession on a grand scale, without retreating to a state of sycophantic guilt guzzling. At the risk of being accused of psychobabble, I suggest that "self-esteem" does not have to be the enemy of the Sacrament of Penance. Rather, what needs to happen is we should be more aware of the immanent and real harm rendered us by the evil we do.

In closing, I would like to quote St. John of the Cross again. I should say, I only incidentally remembered that he had written something in support of my claims here, which I did not have in mind when I sat down to write. He tells us,

"And just as gold or diamond, if it were heated and placed upon pitch, would become foul and be stained by it, inasmuch as the heat would have cajoled and allured the pitch, even so the soul that is hot with desire for any creature draws forth foulness from it through the heat of its desire and is stained by it. And there is more difference between the soul and other corporeal creatures than between a liquid that is highly clarified and mud that is most foul. Wherefore, even as such a liquid would be defiled if it were mingled with mud, so is the soul defiled that clings to creatures, since by doing this it becomes like to the said creatures. And in the same way that traces of soot would defile a face that is very lovely and perfect, even in this way do disordered desires befoul and defile the soul that has them, the which soul is in itself a most lovely and perfect image of God." Ascent of Mt. Carmel, Book I, Ch. 9 (http://www.ccel.org/j/john_cross/ascent/book1.html)

-- Skoobouy (skoobouy@hotmail.com), June 17, 2003

Answers

Response to Sin as Damage--Pastoral Approach to Sin? (corrected version, please delete other)

This is a long post. In sum:

There are three dimensions of sin: 1.) It damages the sinner. 2.) It attacks the Body of Christ; it damages community. 3.) It incurs guilt.

My #1 here is important and neglected. I think this neglect is the main reason for the drop in Confession, indulgences (work out your salvation in fear and trembling), and hostility to the idea of Purgatory.

"Sin damages the sinner" is important pastorally for three reasons: 1.) It's very Biblical, incorporates the language of love, and is implicit in the imitation of Christ. 2.) It motivates change because it is immanent fear. 3.) It can lead to more regular and frquent Confession.

-- Skoobouy (skoobouy@hotmail.com), June 17, 2003.

Hi Skoobouy,

I read the whole thing and I agree wholeheartedly. Just out of curiosity, did you write this for a) your own entertainment b) our benefit or c) some other purpose? It's an amazing essay, whatever the motive.

-- Catherine Ann (catfishbird@yahoo.ca), June 17, 2003.

Thank you Catherine. I myself have difficulty reading it. My sentences are way too full of commas and hyphens and parentheses. It's too bad we can't revise Greenspun posts.

I wrote this as a personal reflection. It's just the ramblings of a young philosopher with theological pretensions. But thanks again. :) God bless.

-- Skoobouy (skoobouy@hotmail.com), June 18, 2003.

The very first "dimension of sin" on your list should be "It offends and angers God."

-- Lisa H. (LHnRG@aol.com), June 19, 2003.

Hi Lisa,

You're right, sin does offend and anger God. This is an essential component to my "3"--sin imputes guilt and calls out for judgement. They aren't seperate, and I think it's a good idea to include all of the parts: Offense, anger, imputed guilt, and call for judgement. We see this reflected in Christ's admonishments to the crowds, at the Temple, and against the Pharisees.

Where this element of sin is remarkably invisible in Jesus' ministry is in his personal interaction with the sinners themselves.

Just a note--the order I put the list is totally arbitrary. Ranked in order of importance, it would actually be (3) then (2) then (1), the same order of Christ's greatest commandements (Love your God, and your Neighbor, as Yourself). However, though these are distinct, they are not really separate.

-- Skoobouy (skoobouy@hotmail.com), June 19, 2003.

In Saint Luke's gospel ch 8:22 we find. They had ''put out osea. Peter's bark and now, Jesus fell off to sleep below deck. A squall swept down upon the lake, and they were filling, and were in peril. (Verse :23.)

The apostles were beside themselves with fright. What was about to happen?

So they came to Him and woke Him, ''Master! We are perishing!''

Jesus arose and rebuked the wind and the raging of the water; and they ceased. And there came a calm. And He said to them: ''WHERE IS YOUR FAITH?''

Jesus is asleep for just the while, my friends. The Church isn't about to perish. Peter's bark is tossed by waves and buffeted in a storm; but Jesus is aboard. Where is your faith?

-- eugene c. chavez (loschavez@pacbell.net), June 19, 2003.

Eugene,

Very insightful! But... a little off topic. :) Could you elaborate?

-- Skoobouy (skoobouy@hotmail.com), June 20, 2003.

I think Eugene was answering Tracy's message about the Pope's seeming unwillingness to "clean house".

Gail

-- Gail (rothfarms@socket.net), June 20, 2003.

Skoobouy: I think you're exactly right. The commandments are not arbitrary. They are a smart way to live. Conversely, sinfulness is not smart. It hurts the sinner and in his or her lifetime.

Wisdom consists entirely in fearing the Lord, and wisdom is entirely constituted by the fulfilling of the Law (Sirach 19:20)

Yahweh watches over the path of the upright, but the path of the sinner is doomed. (Psalms 1:6)

-- Stephen (StephenLynn999@msn.com), June 21, 2003.

Gee, Scoobuoy,
We wandered off the philosophy trail. But it was ponderous to begin with. Let me suggest you post your best ideas in gradual stages, and we'll respond to the diverse content slowly, in better context?

When some party interrupts the flow, suggesting the Church has gone to hell right under our noses, a word of correction ought to be welcomed. There's intelligence in others too, not just in my philosophy honcho.

-- eugene c. chavez (loschavez@pacbell.net), June 21, 2003.

I might add--it seemed to me that Tracy's post was not an innocent tanget, but a deliberate attempt to derail a conversation. Eugene made a fine response to her post, but I would hope that if the subject changed, it would do so naturally, and not just because some troublemakers want to horse around.

-- Skoobouy (skoobouy@hotmail.com), June 21, 2003.

It is very good to study the ramifications of sin as it deepens the mystery and our understanding of Christ's healing of us! It is so easy to take the body and blood of Christ for granted, but when we see sin for what it is, an incurable gaping wound, and when we understand that it is Christ and only Christ who can heal this gaping wound, we love Him all the more!

Thanks for posting this!

Love,

Gail

-- Gail (rothfarms@socket.net), June 21, 2003.

Skoobouy said:

Sin damages the sinner; it rends the soul; it deprives and starves the sinner, leaving him something of a corpse, like an undead thing.

What's an undead thing?

-- Stephen (StephenLynn999@msn.com), June 22, 2003.

Americn Heritage Dictionary:

Undead:

"No longer living but supernaturally animated, as a zombie."

-- Skoobouy (skoobouy@hotmail.com), June 22, 2003.