The Spirituality of Social Justice - Part 2

The Spirituality of Social Justice – Part 2

Once we have the recognition of being a sinner, we must come to realize the full dimension of human sin.  St. Pope John Paul II delivered a series of catechetical homilies on the first eleven chapters of the Book of Genesis wherein he asked us to consider these four archetypal stories as a meditation on human sin.  John Paul finds in these stories four fundamental aspects of sin that call us to conversion both personally and communally. 

The first sin is that of Adam and Eve in the garden.  This sin reveals the first dimension of sin:  it is an offense against God.  The eating of the fruit does not have any other dimension other than the fact that it was a violation against what God had wanted us to do.  The Holy Father reminds us of the relational character of this event.  There is no law or institution or human relation involved in the story.  In this story we stand before God in all of our nakedness to discover the shame of our sinful action.  Adam and Eve both wanted to make this act about someone else, seeking to blame others for what they did.  But God reminds them that this fault is our own and that it stands in relationship not to any other being but to God alone.

In reflecting on this aspect, we have to remind ourselves that we alone are responsible for our actions.  They may be conditioned on many things, but at the end of the day we stand before God and realize that we have sinned and harmed our relationship with Him alone.  The story of Adam and Eve is a call to responsibility and to seeking a right relationship with God.

The second story of sin in the biblical text is the killing of Abel by his older brother Cain.  Here we find the fact that sin harms our relationship with one another.  There are sins against our neighbor.  We do not need God to tell us in a legal code that such sins exist; we can recognize them by their very nature and character.  Sin creates division within the human community, even in the closest of human relationships.  But this sin is not merely an external act; it is something that preceded the external act.  The biblical text reminds us that Cain grew jealous with his brother Abel, for his brother’s gift to God was found to be more worthy than his own. 

Every external act begins with a prior interior disposition and discernment.  This fact was also true in the story of Adam and Eve, for the conversation between Eve and the serpent can be seen as an interior dialogue within Eve that disposes her to commit the external act of eating the fruit.  In the story of Cain the point is more explicit.  In each case we see this interior disposition lead first to sin as offending against God, then in Cain sin as harming and offending our relationship with one another. 

The third dimension of sin is in the story of Noah and the flood.  Here, John Paul points out the cosmic dimension of sin.   The created order was cleansed by God in the flood, an allusion to our baptismal cleansing but also a reminder of the effects of our sins.  Our sin offends against God; it also offends against others.  Sin also disrupts the cosmic order of nature.  The relationship between ourselves and the entire created order lose their harmony and balance originally intended by God.  Our vocation to dominion over all creation becomes one of domination rather than of stewardship.  We are no longer in right relationship with the created order.

In this aspect of sin we become mindful of our responsibility as stewards of creation and our environmental responsibility.  Just as our sins can affect God directly and affect our neighbor directly, so our sins can and do affect the entire created order directly.  Human action does have environmental consequences, and as stewards of creation we are called to be mindful of these and discern how we can exist in right relationship to the created order – not in making a deity of creation as pagans did, but as discerning how God wants us to care for creation as stewards being mindful of the universal destination of goods.

Finally, the story of the Tower of Babel leads us to reflect upon what John Paul II called “structural sin.”  Sin is not merely individual and personal.  Sin can be built within the very structures of our societies – sometimes consciously, sometimes unconsciously.  The Tower itself was a structural sin as it sought to rival and challenge God.  It led to the further distancing and separation among peoples symbolized in the confusing of languages.  Sin has a social dimension that must be addressed.  God called the people of Israel to erect structures of justice within its society, and God judged Israel for its lack of justice within these structures. 

In our examinations we must also look to discern the ways in which we might be participating in and condoning structures of sin within our societies.  Sometimes we become conscious of these and work to create more just societies.  The abolition of slavery, creating  safe working conditions and just wage structures, and the like are all instances in which we came together to recognize a structural injustice and we took corrective action.  Many structural sins exist today that call for examination and corrective action.  The Church calls society to ever examine itself so that we may be what God calls us to be as social beings.

Sin has many dimensions, and none must be ignored.  All of them require our constant examination and reflection.  To neglect one is eventually to neglect them all.  We must have a sense of sin in all of its dimensions.  These stories from Genesis are a constant reminder and reflection for us to be aware of every dimension of sin in our lives. 

The God who calls us to lives of holiness in right relationships with Him, one another, the order of creation, and in the structures of society is also the One who alone can liberate us from sin.  God calls us in the person of Jesus – in his teaching and example – to be in right relationship in all these dimensions.  In our examination and discernment in prayer, we pray:  “Let us pray to the Lord who is a God of love to all peoples.  Father in heaven, the perfection of justice is found in your love and all mankind is in need of your law.  Help us to find this love in each other that justice may be attained through obedience to your law.  We ask this through Christ our Lord.  Amen.”