Sin is any voluntary transgression of the laws of an all-loving and just Creator.  All sin is an infinite evil in three ways and mortal sin is an infinite evil of a fourth way too.[1]

The Church strives continually to impress her children with a sense of the awfulness of sin that they may fear it and avoid it.  We are fallen creatures, and our spiritual life on earth is a warfare.  Sin is our enemy, and while of our own strength we cannot [i.e., would not] avoid [all] sin, with God’s grace we can.  If we but place no obstacle in the workings of grace, we can avoid all deliberate sin.[2]

Adam and Eve were created by God, with free will, and were tested by being commanded not to eat from a certain tree.  Well, they failed the test and were expelled from Paradise, along with their future offspring.  As the world population grew and became steeped in sin, God flooded the world and killed everyone, with the exception of Noah and his family.

However, the world continued along its evil path despite His wish for His creatures to be happy with Him in Heaven.   From time-to-time, God sent upon His creatures a number of catastrophes as warnings to repent and reform their lives.  Some people did reform; many did not. 

In His mercy He sent His only begotten Son to suffer and die a horrible death for us.  The scope of this merciful gesture reflected the magnitude of man’s debt to his Maker for the evil and the sins committed over the centuries.

Thinking of the phrase “Jesus was scourged” doesn’t truly give an accurate picture of what that meant.  (Nothing really could.)  The Son of God was “bound to the pillar and had His clothes torn off, while strong men with whips, cords, and straps with iron spikes scourged Him.  The whole body of Our Lord was one great wound.”[3]

Yes, Good Friday and Lent are behind us now, but it behooves us to keep this scene in our minds and souls always, lest the enormity of Christ’s sufferings and death fade in our preoccupation with our busy lives. 

So, wake up, readers of the Catholic Candle!  God sent His only-begotten Son to suffer and die a horrible death to demonstrate the very great evil of sin. 

Here are salvific reminders from Fr. Paul O’Sullivan and Bishop Morrow, to help us rise from mediocrity:

We know clearly that God is looking at us, and still, we deliberately offend Him; we offend Him to His very face. 

The fire of Purgatory is the same terrible fire as the fire of Hell.  We may be kept in this awful fire for many years for a deliberate venial sin.  God could never punish us too severely.  He does not send us to Purgatory because He is angry with us, but because the malice of a deliberate venial sin is simply awful – mortal sin much more so.

The Saints say there is nothing so terrible on earth as a deliberate sin.  Were we to see a dead body in horrible corruption, it would be nothing in comparison with even a venial sin.[4]

The greatness and the duration of a soul’s sufferings in Purgatory vary according to the gravity of the sins committed.  One who has lived a long life of sin, but is saved from Hell only by a deathbed repentance, will stay in the purging fires of Purgatory longer, and suffer there more intensely than a child, who has committed only the venial sins of an ordinary child.[5]  

If you love God, hate sin, and pray often and devoutly, then you’re cooperating with God’s grace, on the narrow and good road toward heaven.