Let us ask ourselves: Do I live my faith consistently, that is: What I live in church, do I try to live in the same spirit outside of church? With feelings, words, and actions, do I translate what I say in prayer into concrete respect and closeness for my brothers and sisters? Let us think about it.
Pope Francis thus proposed this mini examination of conscience based on the Gospel reading of this September 1, before he prayed the midday Angelus with those in St. Peter's Square.
Noting the hypocrisy of the Pharisees, intent on rituals rather than the heart, the Pope noted some modern-day examples:
One cannot, for example, come out of Holy Mass and, already in the churchyard, engage in nasty and merciless gossip about everything and everyone: that gossip that ruins the heart, that ruins the soul. You can't! You go to Mass and then do these things, that's bad!
Or show piety in prayer, but then at home treat your family members coldly and aloofly, or neglect your elderly parents, who need help and companionship. This is a double life and one cannot [live like this]. And this is what the Pharisees were doing.
Or, again, one cannot be apparently very fair to everyone, maybe even do some volunteer work and some philanthropic gestures, but then on the inside, cultivate hatred toward others, despise the poor and the little ones, or behave dishonestly in one's work.
The Pope said that this duplicity "reduces ones' relationship with God to outward gestures."
"We are made for something else," the Holy Father insisted, saying we need the "purifying action of his grace."
May Mary, most pure Mother, help us to make our lives, in heartfelt and practiced love, a worship pleasing to God (cf. Rom. 12:1).
