The significance and the value of such an attitude also appear from the fact that the better a man’s inward condition and the more he feels touched by God the wider the doors of his heart will be opened and the readier he will show himself for being changed. Whenever, on the contrary, some baser impulse gets the upper hand in a man’s soul, he will shut himself up, and the doors will close again. He will harden and attempt to maintain himself.

There is a deep nexus between a kind, unrestrained attitude in general, and the state of fluidity, openness, and receptivity to formative action from above. Still more is the act of free inward surrender to God inseparable from that state of fluidity and receptivity; whereas, by bolting ourselves up and entrenching ourselves in our nature we stifle in our souls the growth of the germs implanted by God, and an opposition to higher appeals will consequently arise in all domains.

The readiness to change is an essential aspect of the Christian’s basic relation with God; it forms the core of our response to the merciful love of God which bends down upon us: “With eternal charity hath God loved us; so He hath drawn us, lifted from the earth, to His merciful heart” (Antiphon of Praise, Feast of the Sacred Heart). To us all has the inexorable yet beatifying call of Christ been addressed: Sequere me (“Follow Me”). Nor do we follow it unless, relinquishing everything, we say with St. Paul: “Lord, what wilt Thou have me to do?” (Acts 9:6).

2

Contrition

THE initial step of the soul’s meeting with God bears the mark of contrition. The man whose heart is smitten by the word of Christ, whom Jesus’ face has brought to his knees, will at first say with St. Peter: “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord” (Luke 5:8). Confrontation of our own selves with God renders us conscious of our unworthiness and sinfulness.

That consciousness of sin fills us with pain: the guilt we have incurred burns our souls. Thus, with a contrite heart we fall on our knees before God, exclaiming: “To Thee only have I sinned, and have done evil before Thee,”

It is in repenting our sins that we expressly repudiate evil, and revert to God. By the same token we also experience our sin turning in enmity against us: “My sin is always against me” (Ps. 50:5). Without this basic revocation of our offenses against God there can be no genuine surrender to Him; without a radical breach with our past sins we can evince no readiness to be transformed by God, nor obey Christ’s call, sequere me. It is true penitence, it is contrition alone which thus melts the encrusted heart so that that fluidity of which we have spoken becomes possible—and with it, reformation by Christ.

What is the essence, however, of true penitence?

Bad conscience is not the same as contrition

There exists a kind of bad conscience which must be sharply distinguished from penitence. We can well imagine a sinner who, without being really penitent, suffers from a guilty conscience. He is oppressed with pangs of conscience: he is aware of acting badly, and that awareness disturbs his peace and deprives him of inner harmony. Yet, he still refuses to capitulate; he seeks to benumb his conscience, and clings to solidarity with his sins. This kind of sinner is typified by Macbeth, while sinners like Richard III or Don Giovanni are not bothered by remorse at all. But remorse as such may involve no metanoia, no change of heart. In spite of his bad conscience, a man may refuse to shift his position: he may persevere in deliberate identity with himself as the author of his sins and, much though they oppress him, heap new sins upon the old ones. He may harden his heart against remorse, being loath to reverse his path.