Reading 127, from Archbishop Gianfranco Girotti

March 16, 2008

Sin

I have been brooding for the last few days about some of the things I want to write here. I purposely slowed down and tried to turn inwards. I will post thirteen more times today and try to create a vision of those issues which haunt me now.

Before I proceed, I must thank d sinner for prodding me to write.

The Vatican has issued a list of seven new sins (but not as an official update) and the world is laughing. Some are calling the Holy Roman Catholic Church a hypocrite par excellence. Look, some say, when the world seems to disregard the silly Pope, we have a doddering Bishop declaring that there are newer sins. LOL.

But we do not realize that behind this listing of sins is a deep awareness about the purpose of human life and the urgent measures we have to take to stop ourselves from self-destruction.

Here are the new sins:

  1. Environmental pollution
  2. Genetic manipulation
  3. Accumulating excessive wealth
  4. Inflicting poverty
  5. Drug trafficking and consumption
  6. Morally debatable experiments
  7. Violation of fundamental rights of human nature
I invite you to ponder on each of the above social evils and think for yourself whether these do not perpetrate ills? When people are needy and want money more than food, then do we not often give them less. Take it or leave it, we might say and pocket the inordinate profit…when some genius of a biologist tries to cross a human with a primate, does he pause to think of the hell he creates for the mutant?
Religion is always concerned with daily living. That can never be religion which sees the Divine as divorced from daily life. And for most the path to spirituality begins with some degree of self-restraint. And that is what the list of sins encourage us to do — have some self-restraint. We laugh at it at our own peril.
Posted by rhapsodysinger
Filed in Catholic, Christian, Daily Readings, Death, Ethics, Judaism, Lectio Divina, Peace, Philosophy, Quest, Self-help, Society, Spirituality, Truth, Universal
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