In the Gospel, Jesus says, this generation is an evil generation. Why? Because it was so resistant to repentance! It didn’t want conversion, it wanted signs, it wanted a magic show, it wanted to be entertained. Sounds familiar!
For weeks the diocese of Cleveland has been hosting television commercials to advertise that every parish in the diocese will have confessions this evening from 5 to 8pm. If there is anyone in your life who has fallen away from the Church. Like the Ninevites, they might surprise you and respond very positively. If they are on the fence, offer to come with them.
The people of Nineveh, wicked as they were, made the connection between their sins and impending destruction. These people frequently brutalized and butchered large numbers of people. They were pagans, spiritually dead, the least likely to repent. Yet the prophetic word pierced their hearts, and they repented en masse.
Jesus himself pointed to the repentance of the Ninevites as exemplary.
When people are in sin, encouraging them to repent is not unkind or cruel or “judgmental”. It is an act of love, because only in this way can they correct their lives and receive eternal life.
During lent we undertake the practices of prayer, fasting, and almsgiving to show our repentance. By them we pray for a transformation of our hearts and a transformation of our world for the glory of God and salvation of souls.
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