Sin – it’s an ugly word, isn’t it?  So much so that it has tended to become rather ‘sanitised’ nowadays, and watered down – passed off as ‘crime’, which is a legal infringement rather than ‘sin’ which is a moral one, and a crime therefore against God!  Sin has become ‘unfashionable’ and the whole concept of Hell dismissed as ‘superstitious nonsense’ peddled by ‘hell-fire’ preachers, and psychologically damaging!  Oh dear, just one more indication of the ‘snowflake’ society which we have become in recent times!

The readings for today though invite us to take a long, hard look at sin, to recognise it for what it is in all its enormity, and to take back our responsibility for it.

In the first reading, the authors of Genesis propound what they understood to be the cause of sin and evil in the world – in other words, humankind’s preference for its own wilfulnessover obedience to the loving will of God. As a result of sin, the struggle between good and evil became an inherent aspect of the human experience. This struggle of strike and counter-strike continues unabated but not unaided, alas.

As Paul points out to his readers in Corinthians, God’s grace is bestowed in abundance in order that we may not lose heart as we struggle. In today’s gospel, Jesus is accused of being in collusion with Satan or, at the very least, of being out of his mind. Putting evil in its place and naming sin for what it is, Jesus reminds us that sin and evil must be confronted; the relationship we were meant to enjoy with God will be restored only when we learn to do as Jesus did. . . to do the will of God in all we are, and in all we do.

Today’s readings present three incidents which are often discussed in religious circles.  The first is the way that Adam was caught out by God after he sinned.  Adam said that he hid himself because he was naked. Why – why was he embarrassed by his nakedness?  The second incident is in the Gospel where Jesus said that all sins can be forgiven except sin against the Holy Spirit. Whatis this?  The third incident is also in the Gospel, the references to the mother, and the brothers and sisters of the Lord. If Mary was always a virgin, then who were those brothers and sisters?  In Hebrew parlance, a cousin or other close relative is a brother or sister. Jesus was seeking to convey that all those who listened with sincerity to what he had to say were, by extension, ‘his family’, and there was no intention thereby to dishonour his own mother and blood relatives!  Just rememberthe trade unionists habit of referring to all their comrades as ‘brothers and sisters’ as an extensionof the same thought process. Preachers also commonly refer to their listeners in a similarmanner, as did I only last Sunday! Perhaps these three topics do not appear to be related, but they are if we consider these readings from the viewpoint of sincerity and living our faith.

Adam’s sin is exposed in the simple act of hidinghimself, and thereby revealing his own guilt.  In the beautiful anthropomorphic imagery of the creation story, that is God, taking on the form or a human being, looks for Adam in the Garden.  Adam tells God that he hid because he was naked.  This really is not remotely to do with nudity.  God created the body and therefore it is beautiful, and not something that Adam had the slightest need to seek to hide from God. No, this is about being exposed before the Lord.  Adam was revealed as proud.  He wanted to be like God.  Adam was self-centred.  His desires were moreimportant than God’s will.  He was disobedient.  God could not tell him what he could, or could notdo.  Then, at the fall, Adam recognized what he was really like; proud, egotistical and disobedient.  He was exposed before God. He was naked.  He hid himself.  Even during God’s questioning, Adam refused to take the blame for his actions – a clear case of BSE- Blame Someone Else!  According to Adam, it was Eve’s fault, and she in her turn blamed the serpent.  Adam even reminds God that it was he who was responsible for creating Eve.  Adam’s nakedness was thus even further revealed.  It is sad, but we can look into the depths of Adam’s nakedness and see in it our own refusal to submit to God’s will, as well as our own rationalisation for the things we do wrong.

The scribes in the Gospel were also exposed for whom they were – people who quite simply and unashamedly used religion for their own ends.  They were not in the least spiritual.  They deliberately sought to misrepresent Jesus’ good works as coming from the devil.  How can Satan drive out Satan, and thereby destroy himself?  If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand.  And if a house is divided against itself, that house will not be able to stand. And if Satan has risen up against himself, and is divided, he cannot stand; that is the end of him.  But noone can enter a strong man’s house to plunder his property unless he first ties up the strong man.  Then he can plunder his house.  Refusing to see the holiness of the Lord is the great sin against the Holy Spirit, to which I referred a few moments ago. This is the only sin that cannot be forgiven.  God cannot absolve someone who does not believe that God has the power to forgive him.  If there was anything spiritual at all about the scribes, they would at least have recognized some form of goodness in Jesus’ works.  But alas, there was nothing spiritual whatsoever about them.

In the same reading, Jesus was not afraid to expose himself for who he was.  His family thought that he had to be out of his mind to take on the scribes, and leaders of the Jews.  That was a quick and certain way to an early death.  Why would Jesus do this?  Jesus was not afraid to say what he believed, and to do what had to be done.  Jesus’ family is presented here as coming to try to dissuade him from his public utterances.  Thisphrase, since it also mentions the mother and brothers of Jesus, is often taken out of context, particularly by those who use it as a basis to argue against the virginity of Mary. In the context of scripture, Jesus’ family, and that’s all his family, are presented as concerned that he was getting himself into trouble.  A common person had to be crazy to take on the intelligentsia of the nation.   Jesus was not afraid to show himself in his true colours.  If revealing himself, exposing himself meant death, then he would die, so that the world might experience the presence of God.

St. Paul paraphrases part of Psalm 116 in today’s second reading, when he says, we believe, and so we speak out.  This is what Jesus did.  That is what Christians must do.  Our actions must expose our commitment to the Kingdom of God.  We have to speak out in the face of evil.  That is the reason why, on occasions, religious leaders and others are not afraid to take positions which may not be popular, but which are moral.  If we don’t stand up for morality, for the truth, then we would not be faithful to who we are, or at least to who we are trying to become.  Evil can only triumph when the silent majority sit on their hands and do nothing, as unfortunately we have seen all too often through the course of history!

Like Adam then, we all stand naked before the Lord.  Do we have to hide ourselves, or do we want the Lord to see us exactly as we are? Today then, let us pray that our spirit and our actionsmay be exposed as actions of people committed to the Kingdom of God.  Amen