A Penitent: from a negative to a positive

I had a conversation with a friend who viewed a website for a new charism by Cloister Outreach. I honestly cannot remember which prospective community it was, but I do remember her asking me in disbelief, "It actually says it is for 'PENITENTS'!" That is when it occurred to me that there is a wealth of misconceptions about that term. It has a negative connotation, which it doesn't deserve. Being a penitent is no worse, nor much different, from being a convert. A penitent is someone who has repented from his lifestyle and/or beliefs away from God and changes his life's path to one in the direction of the Holy One.

One doesn't have to be a gambling or drug addict who converts. Nor are all women who are penitents former prostitutes. This group of people have no doubt the need for conversion, but that is something that happens (or not) in Gods way and as a product of the person's free will. Moreover, those who seek to assist and convert people who are deep into the world of drugs or the illegal/immoral sex trade, just cannot approach it the way the Good Shepherds did after the French Revolution or even as they did in the stories I heard while in formation as a Good Shepherd Companion. As recently as the early to mid 20th Century, the sisters would actually walk into a bar and retrieve the wayward ward in their charge, and the patrons of the pub would applaud. Any intervention like that today could and probably would end the good sister in the hospital or morgue.

There is also the historical "mis notion" that St. Mary Magdalene was a prostitute. No where in the Bible does it say that she engaged in the world's oldest profession. In Christ's time, a woman who was lacking in rank was one who had no man to support her. Remember, women had no legal means of supporting themselves. That happens to be an issue for women in our culture up through the 19th Century and still exists in some cultures today, particularly in the Middle East. If you had relations with a man back then, while it was probably as rampant as it has always been, and were caught, then you could be stoned. We do know that Mary of Magdala was a woman of the world, who found the Love in Jesus Christ that was lacking in her life. This latter fact is something that is experienced by many, many people in the world today. A penitent woman today doesn't need to be engaged in prostitution to have that descriptive title any more than the venerable Magdalen.

We are living in what Pope John Paul II the Great called "a culture of death". This is more than contemporary society's view of abortion, euthanasia or the death penalty. It is the direction of people's lives away from God, period. People who search for the meaning of life are turning to new age, pagan belief systems. Some have no moral compass at all, rejecting what may have been taught them as a young child, due to parental figures seen as hypocrites or by the influence of their peers, in search of that perfectly perfect "good time". Since we have taken away the stigma of being a single mother (a good thing, because it is pro-life), we seem to have also given young adults the idea that it is a lifestyle choice. While watching a TV documentary about the rising number of single parent families and young people choosing to live together as a family without the benefit of marriage, the majority of the females interviewed believed that it wasn't necessary to have a father in the home. The various methods of birth control offered (and I feel pushed upon) young women today not only adds to this misguided idea, but also makes having sex simply a form of recreation that is every humans "right". The Sacrament of Marriage is way outside of their radar. But if just one of these young people decide to purge their worldly lifestyle and follow Him, they are a penitent. That is a good thing.

Moreover, adding to the group are people who are divorced, engaged in a nonsacramental union, single and not living a life of chastity as God prefers and an entire host of people who are ignoring God in their lives. Any one of these people, good people, who choose the path of righteousness and to imitate Christ will be a penitent.

I became a Catholic at the age of 20. I had a good time in college back in the 70's and it involved a lot of partying. I wasn't a bad person, but I wasn't living His will. I married because I felt it was what an "aging spinster" like myself had to do and that was a mistake. It was the annulment process that opened my heart to conversion. I liken myself to the Magdalen, as she went to the tomb of Jesus on the day of the Resurrection. I sought the Living among the dead in the way I lived my life and even in my first attempts at discerning a vocation. But, as I heard in a homily one day, all I had to do was turn around. Jesus was there all the time. I had to recognize him and declare, "Rabboni"! I am now officially a penitent. And, not only is it a good thing, I am proud of it.

Ben Stein's Blog, not his money :)

I received this letter from Ben Stein to CBS' Morning Show today. I have seen it before and have always liked it, but feared the legitimacy of its authorship. So, I checked out www.snopes.com and lo and behold, it is correctly credited to the man whose name tops it. I have been too busy over the past month with a variety of endeavors, so I am taking a break and re posting this letter. I hope you enjoy it.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The following was written by Ben Stein and recited by him on CBS Sunday Morning Commentary.

My confession:

I am a Jew, and every single one of my ancestors was Jewish. And it does not bother me even a little bit when people call those beautiful lit up, bejeweled trees, Christmas trees. I don't feel threatened. I don't feel discriminated against. That's what they are, Christmas trees.

It doesn't bother me a bit when people say, 'Merry Christmas' to me. I don't think they are slighting me or getting ready to put me in a ghetto. In fact, I kind of like it. It shows that we are all brothers and sisters celebrating this happy time of year. It doesn't bother me at all that there is a manger scene on display at a key intersection near my beach house in Malibu . If people want a creche, it's just as fine with me as is the Menorah a few hundred yards away.

I don't like getting pushed around for being a Jew, and I don't think Christians like getting pushed around for being Christians. I think people who believe in God are sick and tired of getting pushed around, period. I have no idea where the concept came from, that America is an explicitly atheist country. I can't find it in the Constitution and I don't like it being shoved down my throat.

Or maybe I can put it another way: where did the idea come from that we should worship celebrities and we aren't allowed to worship God as we understand Him? I guess that's a sign that I'm getting old, too. But there are a lot of us who are wondering where these celebrities came from and where the America we knew went to.

In light of the many jokes we send to one another for a laugh, this is a little different: This is not intended to be a joke; it's not funny, it's intended to get you thinking.

Billy Graham's daughter was interviewed on the Early Show and Jane Clayson asked her 'How could God let something like this happen?' (regarding Hurricane Katrina).. Anne Graham gave an extremely profound and insightful response. She said, 'I believe God is deeply saddened by this, just as we are, but for years we've been telling God to get out of our schools, to get out of our government and to get out of our lives. And being the gentleman He is, I believe He has calmly backed out. How can we expect God to give us His blessing and His protection if we demand He leave us alone?'

In light of recent events... terrorists attack, school shootings, etc.. I think it started when Madeleine Murray O'Hare (she was murdered, her body found a few years ago) complained she didn't want prayer in our schools, and we said OK. Then someone said you better not read the Bible in school. The Bible says thou shalt not kill; thou shalt not steal, and love your neighbor as yourself. And we said OK.

Then Dr. Benjamin Spock said we shouldn't spank our children when they misbehave, because their little personalities would be warped and we might damage their self-esteem (Dr. Spock's son committed suicide). We said an expert should know what he's talking about. And we said okay..

Now we're asking ourselves why our children have no conscience, why they don't know right from wrong, and why it doesn't bother them to kill strangers, their classmates, and themselves..

Probably, if we think about it long and hard enough, we can figure it out. I think it has a great deal to do with 'WE REAP WHAT WE SOW.'

Funny how simple it is for people to trash God and then wonder why the world's going to hell. Funny how we believe what the newspapers say, but question what the Bible says. Funny how you can send 'jokes' through e-mail and they spread like wildfire, but when you start sending messages regarding the Lord, people think twice about sharing. Funny how lewd, crude, vulgar and obscene articles pass freely through cyberspace, but public discussion of God is suppressed in the school and workplace.

Are you laughing yet?

Funny how when you forward this message, you will not send it to many on your address list because you're not sure what they believe, or what they will think of you for sending it.

Funny how we can be more worried about what other people think of us than what God thinks of us.

Pass it on if you think it has merit.

If not, then just discard it... no one will know you did. But, if you discard this thought process, don't sit back and complain about what bad shape the world is in.



My Best Regards, Honestly and respectfully,

Ben Stein