Yesterday I made some very obvious comments about the end times and the situation in the middle east. This did not take a lot of thought. My hit rate went way up. But the posts that I sweat over go unread. Mainly because they are about self examination, self reform.

But I should ignore the hit rate. If this is a worthwhile exercise, it is worthwhile regardless of how many see it. So I’m starting with self examination.

Again.

I am starting this morning with Elspeth’s recent post at TC, in part because I cannot comment on how much I agree with her.

This isn’t something that only afflicts Christians, although it’s particularly inane coming from us because we should know better. It’s an epidemic. Despite the fact that we live in a cesspool of a culture, teeter on a national economic precipice, and produce young men and women who are increasingly less wise or productive despite being more “educated”, every one of us looks in the mirror and thinks we’re okay. We love ourselves and wouldn’t change a thing. It’s quite astonishing!

One of the things I make a habit of doing when I pray is confessing every sin I committed that day that I can remember, great or small. The ladies here can testify that when I was becoming the “Mother Superior” among our little council, I started talking, and we all started talking. What I am if I am worth anything at all is as much the sum total of my missteps as anything else. I am thankful for what I have learned along life’s journey, but I am equally cognizant of my human frailty and need for improvement.

I don’t know about you, but I find the smug, self-righteous posture that it seems every person possesses these days alarming. Indulgers in pornography feel superior to adulterers. Sluts who give it away for free feel superior to prostitutes. Women who have had abortions are “at least” better than those single mothers who dare to give birth to children they can’t afford to raise properly. Liars take comfort in the fact that they’re not thieves. Don’t even get me started on the gossips, but on and on it goes. Everyone can find someone to look at smugly and feel better about themselves no matter how terrible their self is.

Now to the reading…

Psalm 54

1 Save me, O God, by your name, and vindicate me by your might.
2 Hear my prayer, O God; give ear to the words of my mouth.
3 For the insolent have risen against me, the ruthless seek my life; they do not set God before them.
Selah
4 But surely, God is my helper; the Lord is the upholder of my life.
5 He will repay my enemies for their evil. In your faithfulness, put an end to them.
6 With a freewill offering I will sacrifice to you; I will give thanks to your name, O LORD, for it is good.
7 For he has delivered me from every trouble, and my eye has looked in triumph on my enemies.

Mark 13:28-37

28“From the fig tree learn its lesson: as soon as its branch becomes tender and puts forth its leaves, you know that summer is near. 29 So also, when you see these things taking place, you know that he is near, at the very gates. 30 Truly I tell you, this generation will not pass away until all these things have taken place. 31 Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away.

32“But about that day or hour no one knows, neither the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. 33 Beware, keep alert; for you do not know when the time will come. 34 It is like a man going on a journey, when he leaves home and puts his slaves in charge, each with his work, and commands the doorkeeper to be on the watch. 35 Therefore, keep awake — for you do not know when the master of the house will come, in the evening, or at midnight, or at cockcrow, or at dawn,36 or else he may find you asleep when he comes suddenly. 37 And what I say to you I say to all: Keep awake.”

We cannot save ourselves.

The times have always been evil. Always. We may glory in the scandal of the times and not show any shame (and attribute various vices, such as pederasty, to those who came before us, justly or unjustly, so that we feel self-righteous in this age). For we are supposed to be witnesses. Imperfect though we are, to the very partial extent that we refelct the glory of God, we are witnesses against our own generation.

Which (as C. S. Lewis noted) laud their vices while warning about the very thing that the society needs to reform itself. As the politicians in the time of Pitt warned about mercy and feared the mob while hanging or exporting (to Penal colonies such as Australia) those who poached to feed their families, we now warn against intolerance when we should be instead lisgening to the Philokalia, and hating our evil.

For we have to continually reform. We do evil. We are so imperfect. We should not tolerate what we do in our churches.

And to reform, we must face our fears. We will be called fanatics, intolerant, unloving, unforgiving. For the truth is now not tolerated, and self examination shunned.