Repentance Leads to Passion

The Season of Lent which was started on Ash Wednesday with imposition of ashes on our foreheads marking ourselves with the Sign of the Cross, with the immortal words reminded us that ‘we are dust and to dust we shall return one day.’ That powerful reminder of the mortality of our lives was accompanied with an invitation to repent and to turn to the Gospel.

Throughout the season of Lent, the church invites us to repent for our sins. Repentance is not just feeling sorry and seeking forgiveness but more to return to God and believe in the gospel preaching and to make a sincere effort in turning away from sins and wrong doing. Repentance should be accompanied by a commitment to change which involves a constant effort to amend one’s behavior. It is a conversion and to transformation; complete change of heart and mind embrace the Gospel values of the kingdom of God.

All these notions and sentiments are summarized and presented in that penitential prayer we say – Act of Contrition – when we in particular, receive the sacrament of reconciliation – sacrament of confession. Let us repent from our hearts for our sins as we recite the Act of Contrition. O my God, I am heartily sorry for having offended thee, and I detest all my sins because of thy punishments, but most of all because they offend thee, my God who art all good and deserving of all my love. I firmly resolve, with the help of thy grace, to sin no more and to avoid the near occasions of sin – Amen.

The holy scriptures emphasize repentance as a necessary step towards spiritual renewal and reconciliation with God. The verse from the Acts of the Apostles says :(Acts of the Apostles 3:19)

‘Repent, then and turn to God, so that he will forgive your sins. If you do.’

and John 1: 8-9

‘If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and there is no truth in us. But if we confess our sins to God; He will keep his promise and do what is right. He will forgive us our sins and purify us from all our wrong doings.’

These above two verses emphasize the transformative power of repentance, offering a promise of divine forgiveness and restoration.

Jesus is quite clear and straight forward in his message regarding repentance. In St. Luke 13:3 He says, ‘No indeed ! And I tell you that if you do not turn from your sins, you will all die as they did.’

This highlights the urgency and the necessity for the repentance for our sins to receive salvation from God.

From the time Jesus started his public ministry he reminded that the Kingdom of God is at hand or already come. He invited people to repent and believe in the Gospel and repeated it a few times. Since then throughout the history, through the voice of the church same call to repentance is addressed to us not just to the sinners but also good people in fact to all without exception. But you may ask how it can be that good people need to repent. In the case of so called ‘good people, for them their failing consists in the good that they failed to do – commissions. This was the main trust of the parable of the fig tree that Jesus preached about its bareness, fruitlessness, not bearing of fruits. The fig tree was found wanting , not because it produced bad or poisonous fruits, but because it failed to produce any fruits at all; For what is an apple tree if it does not produce apples?

We Christians rarely ask ourselves the question, ‘What have I failed to do’ ? The call to repentance is not merely a call, to turn away from evil, but it is a call to produce the fruits of good living. This is why it is relevant to all to good and bad to sinners and righteous, to all of us. We may not be guilty of great evil, yet could be very selfish very demanding and unconcerned about the needs of others. We are being called from being self-centered to become other centered and become Christ centered or God centered. Christian life is a continuous process of conversion and transformation. Lent is the ideal period for repentance, for conversion and transformation of our lives.

The Season of Lent leads us to experience the passion, death and the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Last Sunday which was called ‘Palm Sunday’ with the blessing of palms and solemn procession with palms in our hands we commemorated joyfully with singing Hossannas, the triumphant entry of Jesus to the Temple of Jerusalem. With that we began the commemoration and celebration of the ‘Holy Week’ the Passion of Lord Jesus with suffering, cross, crucifixion, death and more importantly his resurrection, the triumphant entry to a new life where the angels sing Hossana in the highest, Hossanna forever.

The 3 synoptic gospels written by Mark, Mathew and Luke present the passion narratives in detail as it happened in history, while St. John presents it with a theology showing that Jesus as the Son of God. In the presentation of the passion story by St. Luke he emphasizes and portrays Jesus as the merciful and forgiving saviour of human kind. Even at death, Jesus forgives his executioners, praying for them. “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing” and again almost breathing his last breaths from the cross, he brings comfort, consolation and hope to the thief at the right hand side, saying “You will be with me in paradise today.”

Each year on Palm Sunday, we in the church read and listen to an account of the passion of Jesus, which again will be read on every Good Friday at the liturgical service.

When we read the passion story written by St. Mathew in the 27^th chapeter we are reminded of the cowardice of Jesus’ followers even his apostles abandoning him… Peter keeping a long distance from Jesus, in his hour of greatest need.. the religious leaders and Pharisees plotting his death and handing him over to Pilate to let him be condemned and sentenced to death on the cross.

We are reminded of the cruelty of the soldiers, mocking, hitting, splitting and scourging Him; soldiers who carried the order of execution. We hear too much of sad and bad news, …as it were. But we also see that the emphasis of the passion story is on Jesus the central character of the story…the main figure, Jesus. We see his fidelity, courage and sheer goodness, the mercy and compassion …the love of Jesus for one and all. Earlier at the last supper, having called his apostles as friends and washing their feet…he also said, “There is no greater love than one lays down his life for his friends”. It is that great love that we are reminded and we remember and commemorate with devotion during this week in our liturgical services in particular – The Triduum – the Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, Easter Saturday and Easter Sunday morning.

The passion story shows us how Jesus responded to what was done to him. He absorbed all the violence and transformed it and returned it as love and forgiveness .There was nothing but love in him, even when they nailed his hands to the cross, he was loving it and loving his murderers, his enemies. It helps us to think about that, when we are going through hard times to go through them with love. It was not mere Jesus’ suffering that saved the world and brought salvation to us. But it was his love.

This was the victory of love over the powers of evil, despair and destruction. Jesus was the Good Shepherd, who died because he loved his sheep. In the same way our love gives meaning to our suffering and pain. It is not suffering that redeemed the world but it is love, it is not our suffering that God wants but our love. However love inevitably brings pain. But love also bring peace and joy. Take a mother at the delivery of her child, she goes through pain and suffering, the ‘labour pains’, but love for the child, for another new life makes it all happy and joyful at the end. We are prepared and glad to suffer for someone we love. The follower of Jesus, a christian must not only accept suffering of Jesus. He /She must make it holy. It is love that makes it holy and joyful. The passion of Jesus gives courage, strength and hope to all who suffer. It means we are not alone, and adding our suffering to the suffering of Jesus, we can find peace, hope and joy in our lives.

Rev. (Dr.) Fr. Victor Silva