Homily of His Excellency Selim Sfeir, Maronite Archbishop of Cyprus, March 23, 2025
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ,
Send your Spirit to us sinners during this forgiving season of Lent, so that we may return to you seeking forgiveness. Open your blessed arms to us, and bring us close to you, so that we may meet you with joy and find happiness in knowing you. – HESED
Our Lord Jesus Christ is such a perfect teacher; he uses very ordinary and simple stories to impress upon us great and solemn truths. In the liturgy of the fourth Sunday of Lent, we encounter the parable of the Prodigal Son. Our Lord reveals the entire history of salvation through this parable: the Father represents God who ceaselessly gave Himself, the elder son represents the people of the Old Covenant, who were blessed by being always in the Father’s House and the younger son, who represents the Gentiles who in the blindness did not know God.
Let us think for a moment on the younger son. In his tragic condition, he reveals to us the sad and sorry state of life in sin. The soul in the state of unrepented sin “becomes dull of understanding and is unable to recognize God, or the beauty of holiness. He grows forgetful of God’s law and God’s goodness towards him. He so corrupts his will as to prefer vice to virtue, pleasure to reason, earth to heaven, the evil one to God; and forsaking the paths of virtue, gives himself up to every kind of evil. Hence, he becomes destitute of counsel, reason, sense, and everything that is good; and at last, with all the powers of his soul and body, he worships the creature rather than the Creator.” – Cornelius Lapide
Thank goodness for the grace of Lent, to summon us from spiritual sloth and run to the open arms of the Crucified Christ.
Catechism of the Catholic Church #2094
One can sin against God’s love in various ways:
- Indifference neglects or refuses to reflect on divine charity; it fails to consider its prevenient goodness and denies its power.
- Ingratitude fails or refuses to acknowledge divine charity and to return him love for love.
- Lukewarmness is hesitation or negligence in responding to divine love; it can imply refusal to give oneself over to the prompting of charity.
- Acedia or spiritual sloth goes so far as to refuse the joy that comes from God and to be repelled by divine goodness.
- Hatred of God comes from pride. It is contrary to love of God, whose goodness it denies, and whom it presumes to curse as the one who forbids sins and inflicts punishments.
† Selim Sfeir
Maronite Archbishop of Cyprus