Eating from the tree of good and evil, killing Abel, the Babylon of Enoch… the sins spawned East of Eden…
Ambition and pride, sloth and fear, cynicism and gossip…the sins spawned East of Lake Street…
They’re really not very different and we’re not really different from them. For, from the first sin in the middle of the garden, a demonic struggle has wounded God’s creation: a struggle between light and darkness, love and hate, purity and sin.
It is a cosmic struggle and every sin I commit is a small part of it. “…our struggle is not with flesh and blood,” Saint Paul tells us, “but with the principalities, with the powers, with the world rulers of this present darkness, with the evil spirits in the heavens.”(Ephesians 6:12)
So there stood Cain, “resentful and crestfallen,” jealous that God has looked with more favor on his brother. And as those feelings stewed in his gut, the scriptures tell us “a demon [was] lurking at the door.” And that demon was sin, the sin that brought death into the world. Ah, now I understand the old saying in the Book of Wisdom! "Through the devil's envy death entered the world, and those who belong to his party experience it.” (Wisdom 2:23-24)
Thus, every sin is really a giving in to the thinking of the evil one, who "was a murderer from the beginning.” (John 8:44) Every sin is choosing the side of darkness, of selfishness and sin. While every holy act is an embrace of light, love and the Cross upon which he saved us.
So a great struggle awaits you today in this Holy House. Between God and Satan, light and darkness, life and death. Choose life, my brothers…..in the thousand little ways you will be tempted…Choose life…that you may live! (Cf. Deuteronomy 30:15)
