Conscience

The Expulsion from Eden, 17th century
Artist unknown

Posted on the 5th Day of the 27th Week of Ordinary Time - 2006 AD - Year B

I have often wondered recently why I don't easily find peace of mind. I hear of peace in Christ, but don't, very often, experience this peace myself, except in prayer or during Mass, or when praying the Rosary. It came to me today however, that peace of mind stems from the assurance that we are not offending God. In our words, deeds, actions or thoughts. For various reasons I feel I offend Our Lord in my daily life. For example, when I lose my temper with others (often), when I show impatience (often), when I criticize others (sometimes), when I am obstructive or demanding of respect at work (occasionally), when I drive dangerously, when I indulge a desire or spend money which benefits no one except an impulse, when I get angry with my kids (not too often) or when I let something go with them which I should deal with. All of these things detract from my dignity as a Catholic Christian. They prevent me from realizing the nature we have been handed, as new Creatures, by Our Lord's sacrifice on the Cross. We became a new people, were handed a new and priestly nature and we must live up to it. The impulses which lead to the faults I mentioned above, are symptoms of our attatchment to our basest self. We have to overcome this self to be clothed in the nature God intended for us, and paid for with His Precious Blood. We never have the right to the anger we feel, especially not toward a loved one, the indignity we believe we suffer does not belong to us. Our feelings, desires, emotional disturbances are dust, they mean and are nothing. The restlessness in my soul is because I sometimes avoid the fullness of God's Grace. The palpable living spring which is freely offered, endlessly, and which I only have be open to and predisposed to recieve. But the cares of the world, a tragedy, a poison apple cleverly offered and freely taken, they constrict my openness to His Grace. And I fall away, little by little, without realising, without knowing that I'm not caring. And the world, in its infinite variety and brightness, rushes in to fill the void, and sin compounds tragedy and life becomes death. But through all of this the lifeline of my conscience. Like a compass needle it guides me through the black ocean where the star of God's Grace seems far away and hopelessly out of reach. But before I know it, He has rushed out to meet me half way and help me home again.

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