Being Good Can Be Bad For You!

thought-for-sundayFrom the desk of Fr. Ignatius Waters, cp

Sunday, 25th September, 2016

  An old man once told me he was more ashamed of his sins than sorry for them! At the time, I thought this was very honest. Then I began to think about it. Where does the shame come from? And is it only those of an older generation who are ashamed of their sins. And is it a healthy response to sin and failure? I once heard Tom Murphy, our well-known playwright, being interviewed. He was born in 1936, he served mass in his local church, his faith meant a lot to him but there came the time when, in his own words, he had to rid himself of the idealised idea he had of himself that was tyrannising him! I wrote the words down at the time because I feel our well-intentioned education in the faith did that to many of us!

And especially to those of us who became priests or joined Religious Orders! We began at the top so there was nowhere for us to go after that, only down! Although, to be fair, I remember well when Fr. Andrew Kennedy handed us the Holy Rule, he said something to the effect that it was going to take us a very long time before we would succeed in living it, if ever! And in my youthful enthusiasm, I felt “No, I’m going to make a job of this! Whatever about the rest of them, I’ll make a job of it!”

 When we’re ashamed of our sins, is this the reason? Is it because we fancied ourselves as being above all that? Not perfect maybe but on the way?  Is it because we let ourselves down? The self-image we had of ourselves shattered? Maybe it has very little to do with offending God or hurting others? Maybe our efforts at being good are a matter of keeping the books balanced so that God will have nothing against us? Maybe we’re trying to impress ourselves, or others, when we’re good or trying to be good? God is certainly not impressed by a business relationship of keeping books balanced! Is this perhaps the reason we’ve never experienced God’s love and mercy because we didn’t want to need it? We were nervously trying to keep on the right side of God so we wouldn’t need mercy or forgiveness.

If this is true, it’s awful, isn’t it? It means we do not believe the Gospel. We still believe what we believed way back in childhood: that we wouldn’t be loved unless we were good; that we have to earn it. It’s hard to unlearn this and really believe what Jesus is telling us all the time in the gospels: that we’re loved even when we’re not good. That’s great good news, isn’t it? If only we could believe it! And you know gospel means ‘good news’ and it is!  God loves us because God is good. Being convinced of that is the greatest incentive to keep battling on, not being shocked or ashamed that we still fail in many ways; not letting the great ideals of Christianity crush us instead of encouraging us. They are meant to be beacons lighting the way for us, gently calling us forward to truth, beauty and goodness.

St. Therese says, “Those who live in the spirit of the gospel are not anxiously looking to see the results. They are not counting on success. They are not concerned by how much progress has been made. They live by faith and confidence, giving themselves completely over to God’s mercy”