Seeking Righteousness

Yesterday's reading at Mass (1 John 2:29–3:6) spoke of how "everyone who does right is born of" God. This tells us about the fact that God touches hearts, and those hearts who do not pursue what is righteous are not pursuing God. This means that some people come to the Catholic Church, but they are not seeking what is righteous, but rather something else. Maybe they are seeking to ease their conscience. Maybe they are seeking a sense of community. If they are not seeking true holiness they are not really seeking the Church Christ founded.

When God draws a person toward Himself He "gives birth" to life in a soul, and this always leads it to what is righteous, because, as the same reading said earlier, we know that "God is righteous". God does not inspire evil, or compromise. He inspires people to repent and seek what is good and true. Those who approach the Church or her priests and ask for a blessing but are not seeking to repent of their sins (all of their sins!) are clearly not doing "what is right" because they are seeking something other than the Catholic faith.

What is your motivator when you seek a blessing from God? If it is a selfish motivation, then you were not motivated by God but by your own sinful inclinations. Only when you are seeking true, humble, and self sacrificial righteousness is it motivated by God. This is why the Church must never seek to compromise the faith by encouraging those who live in sin to be happy about their sinfulness.

Every one who commits sin is guilty of lawlessness; sin is lawlessness. You know that he appeared to take away sins, and in him there is no sin. No one who abides in him sins; no one who sins has either seen him or known him (1 John 3:4-6).