Our Gospel presents us with some pretty heavy words. “Amen, I say to you, all sins and all blasphemies that people utter will be forgiven them. But whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit will never have forgiveness, but is guilty of an everlasting sin."
Now the question becomes what is this sin made against the Holy Spirit and can this sin actually apply to us who have been baptized. The answer to this question is “yes” it is possible that we commit this unforgivable sin and thus we should hold it as being most serious.
Thomas Aquinas lists six sins which are made against the Holy Spirit. These sins are (1) final impenitence, (2) presumption, (3) despair, (4) resisting the known truth, (5) envy of another’s spiritual good, and (6) obstinacy in sin.
To put it simply “final impenitence” is when someone refuses to accept forgiveness and mercy for the sins which they have committed. In other words they fail to allow the Holy Spirit to enter into their life in order that they may be freed from the bondage of sin. “Presumption” is the opposite for this sin acknowledges the mercy of God and thus they go onto sin deliberately. They presume that God will be merciful even though they have no intention to reform their life to this abundant font of mercy.
We live in the midst of a world which likes to reject truth. The scriptures testify time and time again to the truth which the Holy Spirit brings into the world, but so often we fail to form our consciences after truth and when we are presented with a truth which is incompatible with our passions we so easily reject it. To reject the truth is to reject Christ and thus is to reject the Holy Spirit who is the bringer of all truth. This leads us to “obstinacy in sin” where one fails to humbly admit that they are wrong and are in need of repentance.
As our verse to the Responsorial Psalm states: “With the Lord there is mercy, and fullness of redemption.” This is precisely why we cannot give into despair. The Lord is merciful with us if we do indeed want His mercy. We cannot go to confession and walk out being afraid of the Lord’s mercy. Through a good confession of one’s sins we are indeed forgiven and God remembers nothing concerning our past sin.
Our first reading took us to Genesis where we were faced with original sin itself. Here God called Adam and Eve to make a confession of their sins, but they were unable to do so. Instead of confessing what they had done they simply pointed their finger at everything, but them self. How would the story of been different if they would of simply confessed what they had done?
