REFLECTION/HOMILY FOR THURSDAY OF THE 29TH WEEK IN ORDINARY TIME 26TH OCTOBER 2023

REFLECTION/HOMILY FOR THURSDAY OF THE 29TH WEEK IN ORDINARY TIME 26TH OCTOBER 2023

Rom.6:19-23; Ps.1; Luke 12:49-53

The Wages of Sin is Death

If you do not know the worth of something or someone, you will not be able to duly appreciate the value. One factor that largely contributed to the success of the transatlantic slave trade in Africa is the ignorant of the African as to the dignity of the human person. When the African man saw the beautiful things brought by the Europeans such as their wears, mirror, guns and so on, he was so fascinated that he counted it as nothing to give up his slaves to the white man. When he ran out of slaves, he went to capture freeborn and sold them out as slaves in return for what the white was offering him. If not for ignorance, he would have known that he was engaging in a self-destructive exercise.

St. Paul tells us in the first reading of today that this is what happens to us each time we give in to sin. Every temptation is a lie. The lie told is that when you give in to it, you will experience great joy, satisfaction and fulfillment. The hidden truth is that giving in leads to death. When you first give in to temptation and you are disappointed that you did not get the desired satisfaction, you are further tempted to give-in more and more so as to reach the point of satisfaction; not knowing that such movement is sinking one deeper into death.

St. Paul clearly reveals that the wages of sin is death. No matter how attractive sin may be and no matter how glamorous the lives of those engaged in sin may be, the end product remains death. This death is not first and immediately physical; it begins from a deep inner feeling of emptiness and loneliness. One tries to make up for this in various ways, but to no avail, resulting in intense inner sorrow, jealousy, and spiritual crisis.

The responsorial psalm tells us that blessed is the man who has placed his trust in the Lord. Nothing is ever able to take the place of God in the life of any man. We have been made clean through the paschal mystery of Christ. If we continue to give in to our sinful natural inclinations, we make pigs out of ourselves who find comfort in the mud than anywhere else. To live in righteousness is to be disciplined. Disciplined comes with pain but the pain is nothing compared to the pain of eternal damnation. Choose the best pain!