Forty Days of Lent in the Desert

I pondered this morning, how Paul spoke about us being both “dead to sin” (Rom 6:11) and “dying” (2 Cor 6:9). In one sense, in thinking that the deed is already accomplished, he speaks about us as being “dead” , and reinforces that thought in Col. 2:20 and Rom 6:8 by saying that we have “died with Christ” , while in other places he speaks about this not having been accomplished, but in process . He must have thought about this analogy often, because in 2 Corinthians 4:10, he clearly speaks about this being a process by saying “always carrying about in the body the dying of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in our body.” So then, I concluded from this meditation that through Baptism we have died with Christ. In Col 2:12 Paul says, “You were buried with him in baptism…” and in Rom 6:4 he says, “We were indeed buried with him through baptism into death.” But after we are Baptized, as the Church teaches (CCC 418), our human nature is weakened in its powers, subject to ignorance, suffering and the domination of death, and inclined to sin. This leaning toward sin is called concupiscence, and because of concupiscence we are weakened. This struggle with sin is identified by Paul in Rom 6 and 7, where he states that our struggle—although the victory is accomplished in Baptism—is continually accomplished in the Sacrament of Penance where we are reconciled with Jesus and his Church (the Body and Bride of Christ) every time that we repent and celebrate this Sacrament initiated by him. The Gospel of John also reveals where Jesus confers the power of this Sacrament on the Apostles by saying, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you. And when he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them: Receive the holy Spirit. Whose sins you forgive are forgiven them, and whose sins you retain are retained.” Jn 20: 21-23 Therefore, we are dying to sin but we are to consider ourselves dead to sin. “…For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body ruled by sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin.” (Rom 6:6) This is a great mystery of transformation that we can hopefully see unfold within us as we struggle, through our cooperation with God’s grace, to always stay united to Christ! by Fred Ganssle