“Repent and believe in the gospel” (Mark 1:15)…
“the world in its present form is passing away”
(1 Corinthians 7:31)
All
that any of us has to do is to watch television for a couple of
hours before we realize just how many commercials are telling us
that we need to go on a diet. Peeling those commercials back just a
little bit, however, what’s really going on is that most diets work
and many people do lose weight, at least after the first week. But,
most people stop dieting before long and within one year of
terminating their diet plans, most return to or even surpass their
pre-diet plan weight. So, crafty marketers keep pummeling these
people with commercials advertising diet plans that make losing
weight look like a snap.
“Drink
this shake and you won’t
be hungry,”
they’re told.
“Take
these pills which depress hunger pangs.”
“Buy
this super-dooper exercise machine and you’ll
look like this in no time flat.”
“Purchase
our
‘great
tasting’
meals, just like these, for one month and we’ll send you an extra
week’s worth of meals”
(which, I bet, most people eat during that month).
You’ve
seen those and many other commercials advertising diet programs, I’m
sure.
The
simple fact is that the most successful weight loss plan around and
that has been around since the 1970’s
is
Weight Watchers. This diet program is based upon the philosophy
that getting to a certain weight and maintaining it requires an
honest and dedicated commitment to a change of lifestyle…that of
healthy eating and in portions which provide everything we need to
eat, not everything we want to eat. People who commit themselves to
the Weight Watchers’
program live in the real world and eat real food—practically any
food they like—but they must discipline themselves continuously to
eat healthy, nutritious, and balanced meals. Success requires
making the decision to devote oneself to this particular lifestyle.
The
good news? It works. The bad news? It requires dedication.
This
philosophy captures well the call to repentance we heard in today’s
first reading from the Book of Jonah and today’s
gospel
from
the evangelist, Mark. For most people, the word “repentance” means
looking back and then having to apologize for past misdeeds. For
Catholics, that almost immediately conjures up the terrifying
specter of having to go to confession, something most Catholics―like
Lutherans and most other Protestants―believe
is completely unnecessary and unrelated to growth in holiness of
life.
The
good news? Repentance doesn’t
mean going to confession. The bad news? That doesn’t mean
Catholics don’t have to go to confession.
Repentance is a personal recognition where I come to the clear
realization and say, “I have to change. I cannot go on living this
way.” Examining our present state, repentance is not about looking
backwards at how we got to be in the awful place we find ourselves.
That may not promote achieving the goal we seek. For example,
if we are overweight, all of the looking back at how we got to be
overweight may be of no help whatsoever in changing our behavior.
In fact, looking back may only cause us to feel guilty, to get
depressed, and to start eating all of the stuff that got us to
become overweight in the first place. Likewise with sin. Looking
back at what we have done previously is likely to cause us to feel
guilty, to get depressed, and to convince us that it’s near to
impossible for us to achieve holiness of life. So, we don’t change
and the same old laundry list of past misdeeds continues to be
written in the present and into the future representing a failure of
spiritual proportions.
In
contrast, repentance requires taking a sober and accurate look at
the present in which we find ourselves and making the determination
that, moving forward, we cannot and will not continue to live as we
are living today. When Jonah and Jesus called for repentance, there
was no requirement to apologize for past transgressions. But, there
was a command for a change of attitude, namely, the attitude about
the place of God in our lives and how we are going to change our
lifestyles to give first place to God. However, it’s one thing
to say, “I believe in the gospel.” It’s an entirely different thing
to make that belief evident in a consistent and dependable
lifestyle. It’s
all about character and, in particular, the character of a holy
person.
All
of this raises the question, “What have we built our lifestyles
around?” Is it “all about me”?
Is it all about pleasure? Is it all about work? Is it all about a
spouse or children? Or, is it all about love of God from which
flows love of neighbor as we love ourselves? All Jesus said to his
disciples was “Follow me.” Is that what we base our decisions upon,
following the Lord wherever he intends to lead us? Or, is our hope
that God will follow us in whatever direction we decide to lead God?
In
his first letter to the Corinthians, St. Paul wrote that the world
in its present form is passing away. The good news? God is
actively at work seeking to restore what we have defiled through sin
by calling us to follow his only begotten Son. The bad news? Jesus
isn’t asking for mere cosmetic change. No, Jesus is calling for us
to repent by making a total commitment to alter the path we have
chosen, just as Simon, Andrew, James, and John had to abandon the
path they had chosen when Jesus called them.
All
of us know that the first commandment forbids idol worship. It
states: “I am the Lord, your God. You shall place no strange gods
before me.” Yet, we oftentimes don’t realize that when we make
something more important in our lives than our relationship with
God, we are creating idols that we worship. To this end, we
need to remember:
·
Neither family nor personal security takes precedence to our
relationship with God.
·
Neither work nor popularity takes precedence to our relationship
with God.
·
Neither possessions nor pleasure takes precedence to our
relationship with God.
·
Neither spouse nor children takes precedence to our relationship
with God.
Why?
In the end, our relationship with God is all that counts in this
life if our goal is eternal life.
“This
world as we know it is passing away,”
St. Paul reminds us just as he reminded the Corinthians.
While each day brings change and we all need to deal with change,
the only thing that ultimately matters in the midst of all this
change is our relationship with God.
Repentance is like Weight Watchers in that repentance requires
making a change in lifestyle, not whacking away at our bad habits,
finding ourselves falling short of our goals after a bit of time,
and then trying yet another approach to achieve holiness of life.
When we repent, we make the firm decision to change, to engage in
the behaviors that this change requires, and to let the rest fall
into place—as it will—if we truly commit ourselves to repent.
That’s the good news.
So,
what’s the bad news? When we discover the more holy person we have
grown to become through our dedicated efforts and the assistance of
God’s
grace, we will not fear confessing who we no longer are. Instead,
we will give thanks to God in Jesus Christ for the gift of
repentance. And that, my friends, is how to prepare for a good
confession!
A brief
commercial break...
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