Question

Dear Father Angelo, 

I’m currently reading a lecture by Saint Alphonsus Liguori about sins. In particular, it is stated that God forgives us a certain number of sins, then the punishment comes and He won’t forgive us anymore. Is this idea approved by the Church? How does it balance with what it is stated about sins  forgiven without any limits in the Catholic Catechism? May punishment limit Mercy?

Best regards.

Anna

Answer

Dear Anna, 

1. Lectures by Saint Alphonsus Liguori need to be read according to his listeners and to their context. In other words, his lectures aren’t a theological treatise in which each word has to be evaluated. When you talk to a specific kind of people and you want to convert them, you give importance to an idea that can be remembered in your listeners’ heads and hearts.  

2. Considering the area he was the bishop of, Saint Alphonsus may have had to speak to people who were part of criminal groups. And maybe he wanted to stress the idea that we can’t exploit God’s mercy, that making mistakes is a human thing, but persisting until the end is evil. In the latter case, it may happen that a person avoids God’s grace and makes his deliverance impossible.     

3. He knew very well that God’s mercy is unlimited and that is open to everyone who invokes it. But maybe he had to talk to people who needed to listen to strong words, who needed conversion in order not to commit sins and not to make divine mercy be useless.  

4. Exactly the day when you wrote to me, in the Office of Readings a beautiful passage was read. It comes from The First Epistle of Clement to the Corinthians, who became the third Successor of Peter and it was written at the end of the first century. It states as follows.

“Let us look steadfastly to the blood of Christ, and see how precious in the sight of God is his blood, which having been poured out for our salvation, brought to the whole world the grace of repentance.

Let us go back to all generations, and learn that in every generation God hath granted a place for repentance to such as wished to return unto him.

Noah preached repentance, and as many as hearkened unto him were saved.

Jonah prophesied destruction to the Ninevites, and they, repenting of their sins, appeased God through prayer, and, though alien from God, obtained salvation. 

The ministers of the grace of God spake by the Holy Spirit concerning repentance; 

and the Lord of all himself spake concerning repentance with an oath. 

As I live, saith the Lord, I desire not the death of a sinner, as I desire his repentance;

adding thereto an excellent saying: Repent, O house of Israel, from your iniquity: Say unto the sons of my people, Though your sins reach from earth to heaven, and though they be redder than scarlet, and blacker than sackcloth, and ye turn unto me with your whole heart and say, My father, I will hearken unto you as to an holy people.

Desiring, therefore, that all his beloved ones should partake of repentance, he hath confirmed it by his almighty will.”

Link: http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/text/1clement-hoole.html

5. I could say that Saint Alphonsus used to speak to those people exactly like Jonah used to speak to the Ninevites. If Jonah had gone there to say “God’s mercy is unlimited”, no one would have been converted. 

But according to God’s order, he said: “Forty days more and Nineveh shall be destroyed”. That means: if you continue like this, the end will be irreparable. So, everyone understood that time. And from the king to the humblest one, all people did penance and were persuaded to convert. 

I wish you a profitable Lent, I will remember you to the Lord and I bless you.

Translated by Giulia Leo

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