Purification
Purification
By Fr Michael Casey
The incident describing Jesus’ action in driving the traders from the Jerusalem Temple is often described as the "Cleansing of the Temple". Its necessity is obvious to the outsider. Buying and selling and changing money are activities that are incompatible with the holiness of that place. For those responsible, however, this inconsistency had become invisible because these arrangements were convenient and they were used to them. When Jesus came along to put an end to these unseemly pursuits it seemed to the Temple authorities as though he was attacking the whole system and that he meant to destroy the Temple. Jesus,however, intended not to destroy the Temple but to purify it.
We also are temples of God and, alas, we also are in need of purification because we have allowed habits to grow that are clearly incompatible with the holiness that God expects from us. Often we lack the capacity to perceive that anything is amiss because we have rationalised our behaviour and denied the overt meaning of particular actions. For one reason or another we are reluctant to confront our need to be active in removing from our life whatever defiles its simplicity. We have become accustomed to our conflicted existence and we cannot imagine living in other way.
The trouble is that we find it hard to distinguish ingrained habits from the totality of our life – we cannot see how we can possibly live unless we give expression to our appetites, angers and ambitions. We fear that without them our lives would be radically different, and we prefer to coast along leaving things as they are. Christ’s action in our soul is to bring to our attention what needs to be done to return our lives to a greater measure of simplicity. This is the fundamental work of Lent. To lead us gently along the path of self-knowledge so that in recognising the extent to which our consciences are compromised, we may turn to Christ and find cleansing and healing.
Pope John Paul II was among those who pointed out that our age seems to have a poorly-developed sense of sin. Constantly pummelled by the mass media, our consciences seem to be losing the capacity to discern between right and wrong, between good and evil. We are fearful of being overwhelmed by guilt, and so the quality of our actions is often left unexamined. What we fail to understand is that when we drift into an ignorance of our own neediness our whole lives become tainted by untruth. We are of ourselves incomplete and impaired; we find our completion and repair in God. It is our consciousness of sin and our desire for integrity and holiness that turns us towards God and leads us to prayer.
More intense prayer is the special work of Lent. Prayer often has the effect of making us see the need for greater probity in our actions and, consequently, the need for God’s grace in trying to live better. It is also the means by which the soul is possessed of a new energy which allows it to take the first few faltering steps towards a more Christlike life. Awareness of sin is energising and not depressive. It teaches us to depend more fully of God and to discover for ourselves how dependable God is. Those who sincerely seek a purer life do find it, though in God’s time and not their own.
