While Jesus challenged sinners to repent of their sins, he also rebuked those who thought they were perfect.
Jesus said to them, “Truly, I say to you, the tax collectors and the harlots go into the kingdom of God before you. For John came to you in the way of righteousness, and you did not believe him, but the tax collectors and the harlots believed him; and even when you saw it, you did not afterward repent and believe him.”
Matthew 21:31-32
It can be tempting to think that because we go to daily Mass, pray the Rosary every day or make a holy hour, that we have a ticket to Heaven and have no room for growth.
Spiritual danger
St. Francis de Sales writes about this spiritual danger in his Introduction to the Devout Life:
[T]here is an extreme danger surrounding those souls who, through the opposite temptation, are disposed to imagine themselves purified from all imperfection at the very outset of their purgation; who count themselves as full-grown almost before they are born, and seek to fly before they have wings.
He explains that we should not leave the Divine Physician, thinking that we are fully healed:
Be sure, daughter, that these are in great danger of a relapse through having left their physician too soon. “It is but lost labour to rise up early and late take rest,” unless the Lord prosper all we do.
It’s also dangerous to think that we are holier than other people.
The moment we start to think along these lines, we are putting ourself in the place of God.
We do not know the inner heart of the person next to us. They could be much holier than we are, even though they don’t meet our standards.
Whatever we do, we need to cling to the Divine Physician and always go forward in the spiritual life, never thinking that we have “arrived” in this life.
And today we celebrate...