Forgive Them Their Sins

“For if we sin willfully after we have received the knowledge of the truth, there no longer
remains a sacrifice for sins” (Hebrews 10:26).

Sin is not everyone’s problem—only for those who love and fear God. Sin is separation from the Lord. Those without the awareness of God elect themselves perfect as they are. The people of God pray for their enlightenment and release from the darkness of ignorance.

We learn in the Bible that the priests’ duty is to offer sacrifices for God’s people. They too are often unaware of their sins. The priest pleads: Father, forgive them. Lord, have mercy on them. The bond of union between God and the person has been sundered. A wall of separation has risen between them. God is holy, and He demands purity from those who have been cut off from the True Vine, Jesus Christ. Men and women were created to enjoy eternal life, but they will die separated from the Lord unless they are transformed from sinfulness to forgiveness. Priests offer sacrifices so that they may become aware of their ignorance. The condition for forgiveness is repentance: I, a sinner begins the penitent’s prayer. But what of the defiant ones? Who sacrifices for those who presume to know more than the ministers of God?

The man who acts presumptuously, by not obeying the priest who stands to minister there before the Lord your God, that man shall die….And all the people shall hear, and fear, and not act presumptuously” (Deuteronomy 17:14).

At first reading it appears too severe; after all, isn’t Christianity about love and forgiveness? But forgiveness and mercy are for those who repent of their stubbornness and pride. What is to be done with those who are unrepentant? How to deal with the ones who are frozen in their convictions? To offer one’s own forgiveness is to confirm the defiant one in his convictions. He was right all along, he truly believes, and it’s about time the priest came to his senses and understood it.

If it were a matter of ignorance, it would be forgiven; but this is about arrogance and self-will. The Lord’s Prayer, that perfect expression of unity between the Lord and His people from the lips of Jesus Christ Himself, puts it so well: “Thy will be done.” It judges the self-righteous who cannot conceive of a plan other than his own. In his fantasy even God’s will must conform to his own. His ideas are fixed and immovable. He has thought out his defiance, even of the priest who was set in place as the pastor, shepherd and teacher of the flock. But the proud one knows which direction the flock should be led.

This is not the type of person who acts spontaneously and impulsively. He doesn’t lose his temper and regret it later. No, he plans his strategy and thinks through his defiance of the pastor. Nothing will change his mind. He’s not sorry. Actually, he’s quite proud of having caused a stir, created a following of like-minded dissenters, and he even enjoys this moment of triumph.

“This my spiritual child [N] is absolved through me, unworthy though I am, from all things in mortal life he/she has sinned against God….If he/she is under the ban or excommunication of a Bishop or a Priest, or has sinned by any oath, or is bound by sin but has repented of them with contrition of heart: let him/her be absolved from those faults and bonds (Prayer of absolution before burial).

We offer confession at the time of death for a last chance to repent, and for the proud person to surrender his or her will to the will of the Lord.