Ist Sunday of Lent- Gen 2:7-9; 3:1-7; Rom 12:5-19; Mt 4:1-11

The Church begins the season of Lent with a reflection on the origin of sin among us.

 The first reading from the book of Genesis (Gen 2:7-9, 3:1-7) describes the “Original Temptation".  Satan told the first parents, if you eat the fruit :"You will be like gods, knowing what is good and what is evil."  (And they fell for that temptation of Satan.) God can test us and allow Satan to test us too as we find in the beginning of the book of Job. Because without testing we can never know how strong you are. Each time we win a temptation our strength grows.

James 1:13-14 says God does not tempt anybody. Every one is tempted by one’s own cravings. God tests us by drawing us to choose Him and do good things and Satan always to evil things. Any pull to do evil is called temptation. We are inspired to do good, not tempted to do good. The primary part of any temptation is from within oneself. Let’s look at the account of the Original Sin. When Satan asked Eve, did God tell you not to eat the fruit of this tree? What did Eve say? She said: God said ‘You shall not eat it or even touch it, lest you die.’”  God did not say they should not touch it. Where did this twisting of the fact come from ? From within herself. She twisted the fact and that revealed her attitude to God’s command as being too strict. That made it easy for Satan to make her break it. So, the temptation comes from within oneself and the cause for it comes from outside. That is why Jesus said, it is not what goes into a man but what goes out of a man that makes one unclean.

Back to the Original Sin- God placed the creation under the dominion of man- asking Adam to name every creature. Only those who had power could name anybody. Parents name the children. But when man yielded to sin and accepted Satan’s expert advice, Satan got dominion over man and everything under man.  This truth is verified in today’s temptation story.

Then the devil took Jesus up to a very high mountain,
and showed him all the kingdoms of the world in their magnificence, and he said to him, "All these I shall give to you, if you will prostrate yourself and worship me.” Now, how can Satan give the kingdoms of the world to Jesus, if those did not already belong to him?. Take note the point that Jesus did not refute Satan’s claim of possessing all the kingdoms of the world. Jesus did not say that Satan was telling a lie, the kingdoms did not belong to him.

In John 14:30 Jesus says, the ruler of the world is coming, referring to Satan, who was going to take control over Judas and others in the trial. Then he adds: He has no power over me. That means Satan has power over others.  And in Jn.16:33 Jesus says, take courage I have overcome the world. This he told in the context of his death and resurrection, by which he would overcome the Satan and get the dominion of the world back from Satan to those who will believe in him. (Keep in mind that Jesus was already rolling back Satan’s kingdom whenever he drove out evil spirits from people). So, whoever surrenders himself to Jesus in faith, is no longer under the power of Satan. Yesterday I was reading a piece of news from Egypt where a priest does exorcisms every weekend in his church and most of the people brought there are Muslims. And the Muslims openly admit that their Mulla’s are not as powerful as a Catholic priest in driving out demons.

A few months ago I noticed a lady filling up so many jars with holy water. I asked her why she was doing it? (making our water bill go high, I wanted to say). She said her house is haunted. They get awaken most of the days at the middle of the night and it has been going on for so many years. She is a Baptist. And I told her: You should ask your pastor to do an exorcism; and she said our pastors don’t do that. And I said that, if it does not get any better by the holy water application, give me a call and I would come and bless her house. She did and I went and blessed her house in Burlington and she never came back here for taking holy water, I believe. We know that at the name and cross of Jesus, Satan shudders.

Jesus overcame the world, and when we are baptized in him, Satan has no power over us those that belong to Christ. But he can frighten and intimidate even those who belong to Christ. I once heard that Satan is like a bullying manager who mistreats his employee and tramps down on him. One day a gentle man walks in and observes this mistreatment and offers this employee a job in his firm and he comfortably works for him there. One day, the old employer walks in and finds him working there and starts giving orders to him as he used to before. The employee due to the old fear in him for this old employer feels frightened; not fully coming to consciousness that he is no longer under him. This is what happens with Christians who are afraid of Satan and are under the Satanic fear. We are set free by the blood on the Cross for ever as Paul says in today’s second reading. Through one man came sin and death, but through another man, the Son of man, came pardon of sin and eternal life. (Now you may ask why did Jesus lock Satan in an iron box, instead of allowing him roaming freely now? I believe, it is to help us love God more. Only free beings can love. If we don’t get tempted, we would love God as robots, we need the freedom and make the choice to love God. For that, Satan has to be here around).

But remember that anytime we sin we are moving to the domain of Satan again and we are giving him freedom in our life. And the longer we stay there we get used to that situation. Like the Hebrews who wanted to go back to the old comfort of Egypt.  We feel comfortable in that sinful state and don’t make adequate effort to go to confession and free ourselves again.

We need to know that there are three categories of sins.  On a scale of 30 inches, say for instance, 1-10 are venial sins. 11-20 grave sins and 21-30 are Mortal sins. The gravity of sin is considered on three grounds. First, the objective gravity of the matter.  Secondly, knowledge of the gravity of the matter to the sinner. How much did one know that the matter was grave and all its implications. Third, the co-operation in the matter or the willingness of the sinner in the act. Did he fully or partially co-operate in it. Now venial sin is like a simple sickness, like common cold. For this, there are two options. One can take a medicine or it can be cured by itself, may be taking a few hours of rest. So, we can take the venial sins to confession or repent and ask God for forgiveness by attending a Mass and receive holy communion; that venial sin is forgiven. But the Grave sin is like a grave sickness; say for instance, a stomach ulcer, pneumonia, tumor, cancer. All these grave sicknesses if left untreated, can kill us. So, we need to repent and take it to confession (You cannot treat any of these sickness by yourself, you have to go to a doctor). If we don’t treat them, we are liable to be dead soon.

Mortal sin is something of a different nature. Mortal means deadly. It is like a heart attack; you need a CPR to be resuscitated. So, if you don’t get a CPR ? you cannot be brought back to life. So, it is primarily God’s gracious action that brings a mortal sinner to grace and if the sinner co-operates he will be healed. And if one dies in that state, he is gone forever. That is why the moment of death is considered very crucial for anybody. Now most of the sins that we do, may probably fall under the category of Grave sin. Not going to Church on Sunday, is a grave sin, not mortal sin. In every grade of sin there may be different degrees too. So, we can never really judge the gravity of any sin with absolute certainly and clarity. Even though we know the matter was grave, we don’t know how well we co-operated or how well we knew of the gravity. For instance, an abortion or murder is always a mortal sin. But the gravity of that mortal sin can be varying depending on the circumstances.  In the case abortion, an unwed mother or a well placed married woman, do not fall on the same level of gravity. Their freedom in choosing the matter and the circumstances would be different.

The important thing to be kept in mind during this lent is that we should confront our temptations and conquer them as Jesus did, by fasting, prayer and the Word of God.    As God said to Cain in Gen.4:7, the sin is lurking at the door, its desire is for you, but you must master it.  The “desert experience” was like a training camp for Jesus to enhance his resolve to fight sins. That is why the Spirit led him there. Let’s ask the Spirit to guide us through this desert experience during this lent so that we may be able to defeat the Satan and see through his tricks.