Some of the Pharisees … said to him, “Surely we are not also blind, are we?”
Jesus said to them,
“If you were blind, you would have no sin;
but now you are saying, ‘We see,’ so your sin remains.”
What Jesus is telling them, and us, is that spiritual blindness is a personal choice. The Pharisees were witnesses to the miracle of restoration of the sight of the man born blind. They investigated it thoroughly. However, because there was so much at stake, they chose to ignore the facts in front of them. They chose to remain blind. They insisted that they were the ones who could see the truth, but they ignored the truth right in front of them. They claimed knowledge of Sacred Scriptures and they claimed positions of authority, authorized in Sacred Scripture. But, if they acknowledged Jesus as the promised Messiah, then they would lose their authority and their power. Their authority was more important to them than the truth of God right in front of them. That is why Jesus told them,
“If you were blind, you would have no sin;
but now you are saying, ‘We see,’ so your sin remains.”
We are beginning the fourth week in Lent. Last week we heard the Gospel account of Jesus with the Samaritan woman at the well. She chose to believe in Jesus because he revealed the truth of her own life to her, that she did not have a husband, although she had lived with five men. He showed her how to see clearly and she accepted him as the Messiah. And, she brought many others to faith in Jesus.
That was a moment of conversion for her. Her life was changed forever.
Repentance and conversion change your life. That is the lesson of Lent. We emerge from our darkness.
We all have moments that have the potential to change our lives. Sometimes these moments are very challenging, often because we become aware of just how much change we are being asked to accept.
Fr. Alex and I were discussing conversion in faith and he asked me about my conversion. What I have discovered is that conversion to faith in Jesus Christ and his Church, is not a one-time thing, but something that happens over and over again, perhaps in several key moments in our lives.
I recall when I was 17 years old and lost, with no real faith life. I had become friends with a man who had a very real devotion to Christ, the Blessed Mother and the Church. He never invited me to share his faith or go to Mass, but I saw his faith and values active in his every day life. I wanted what he had. I wanted the peace and wholeness that he enjoyed living a sacramental life. I resisted, until one night I broke down and began to cry asking the Blessed Mother to help me. She has. My life was changed forever. There was no going back. I chose to be a child of the Catholic Church and a son of Mary.
My wife was a convert also, and I remember how emotional I became when she received her First Communion. We shared our faith together until the end of her life. That light guided our entire married life, even through dark times.
I’m certain many of you parents can recall the first time you held your newly born child. As you gazed upon your child, you realized that there was no going back. You held new life in your hands and you were discovering a new love. Your life would be different forever. This is new light. Something in your heart changes forever. You see things differently. There is no going back.
We will all struggle with death. Death can be frightening; and even more frightening for someone who does not believe in Jesus’ Resurrection, or have the Hope of eternal salvation.
St. Paul tells us to hold fast to our conversion to the light of faith, when he said,
“You were once darkness,
but now you are light in the Lord.
Live as children of light.”
Regarding death, he gives us what was probably an early Christian Baptism hymn,
“Awake, O sleeper,
and arise from the dead,
and Christ will give you light.”
We can all seek new conversion. It is a choice. Scriptures call us to repent. In Lent, the Church calls us to repent and believe in the Gospel. Lent requires that we stop and reflect and pray, and live as “children of the light”.