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Question

Dear Father,

I beg your pardon, but I would like to know what prayers I should say if I fall into grave sin. Obviously after a good and holy confession… Can you help me to understand? In addition, I ask you whether or not I can seek the intercession of the saints if I am in a state of sin…This is the first time that I turn to a priest for clarifications. I am sorry but I ignore many things, I would like to understand. 

Andrea

The priest’s reply

Dear Andrea,

  1. When you fall into sin, the most authentic and spontaneous prayer you can utter is this: “O God, be merciful to me, a sinner”. We could even say that Jesus Himself taught us this prayer in the Parable of the Pharisee and the Tax Collector. Tax collectors were sinners and were recognized as such by everyone. Now, entering the temple, this tax collector does not dare to draw nearer, he stands off at a distance and beating his breast he says: “O God, be merciful to me, a sinner” (Lk 18:13)
  2. Please note that not only did he send up a prayer, he also beat his breast. Saint Augustine comments: “The Pharisee […] was casting his eyes down to the ground, and lifting up his heart; he was beating his breast and curing his conscience. Why say more? He went home justified, rather than that Pharisee. If you ask for the reason; for everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and the one who humbles himself will be exalted (De verbis Domini, Serm. 36).
  3. By the way, this also applies to the divorced and remarried, to cohabiting couples, to whoever lives in a situation of sin. 
  4. When we realize that we are sinners (we always are, but sometimes we are more sinners due to our actions), we feel the need to accompany prayer with penance, as a wish to repair with Christ the evil that we have done. 
  5. After committing a sin we do not feel like saying “Lord, I love you with all my heart”. This is a lie, a contradiction. Through this parable Jesus came to our aid and taught us the truest prayer: “O God, be merciful to me, a sinner”.
  6. What kind of penance can we combine with prayer? It might be a longer prayer (for someone this is a penance, for others it is a grace). This prayer might be the Rosary, or we might do a little pilgrimage by going to a church and lighting a candle to the Lord or to the Virgin Mary pleading with them to be merciful to us.  Or we might renounce something we like.
  7. Finally, you ask me whether or not you can seek the saints’ help when you are in a state of mortal sin. Saint Augustine wrote: “if God did not listen to sinners,  it would have been all in vain for the tax collector to cast down his eyes to the ground and strike his breast saying: ‘Lord, be merciful to me, a sinner’ ” (Commentary on the Gospel of John, tract. 44). And Saint John Chrysostom: “Everyone who asks, receives: that is to say, whether he be righteous or sinner” (Op. imp. in Mt hom 18).
  8. Nevertheless, in the Gospel we come across these words, uttered by the man blind from birth: “We know that God does not listen to sinners, but if one is devout and does his will, he listens to him” (John 9:31). 

Saint Thomas Aquinas, after mentioning Saint Augustine’s comment, says: “this blind man is speaking as one who has not been anointed, as one who does not yet have complete knowledge. For God does hear sinners, otherwise it would have been futile for the tax collector to have prayed: God, be merciful to me a sinner (Luke 18:17). Accordingly, if we wish to save the statement of the blind man we must say that God does not hear those sinners who persist in their sinning; but he does hear those sinners who are sorry for their sins, and who should be regarded more as repentant than as sinners”(Commentary on John 9:31).

  1. Therefore, when you happen to be in a state of grave sin, if you are sorry for your sins, do ask for the saints’ intercession. They will hear you and speak to the Lord on your behalf. 

I wish you all the best, I assure you my prayers and I bless you.

Father Angelo