The spiritual life is a constant striving toward the perfection Christ wills for his Church: “Be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect” (Matt. 5:48). Yet every Catholic knows this painful truth: even after confession and firm resolutions to avoid sin, we can (and sometimes do) fall again.
When that sin is mortal, we ought to “have recourse to sacramental confession as soon as possible” after committing it (CCC 1452). We must return to God in repentance, who is ”rich in mercy and knows our frame” (Ps. 103:14). The Council of Trent calls the sacrament of confession the “remedy of life,” given to those “who, after baptism, may have delivered themselves up to the servitude of sin and the power of the devil” (Session 14, Chapter 1). In this sacrament, we entrust ourselves to the faithfulness of God, who promises, “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just, and will forgive our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:9).
However, there remains a practical question: What should we do during the interval between committing sin and confessing sin? How should the soul, deprived of sanctifying grace, return to God without falling into despair, presumption, or self-reliance?
Fr. Dom Lorenzo Scupoli, a sixteenth-century priest and master of the spiritual life, gives a simple answer in chapter twenty-six of The Spiritual Combat: do not lose courage, humble yourself before God, and entrust yourself to his divine mercy. Following his basic outline and supplementing it with the wisdom of other eminent Catholic authors, we may draw out the following practical steps so that our striving for perfection might not be extinguished:
Do Not Lose Courage
When you recognize your fault, do not lose courage or panic. One fall is not permission for another. St. Paul warns that excessive sorrow can be an occasion for the evil one to “gain advantage over us” (2 Cor. 2:5-11). This isn’t because sorrow in itself is bad, but because sorrow can sometimes direct us inwardly rather than to God in repentance.
After mortal sin, the devil often tempts the soul to two extremes. He might arouse thoughts of despair—“You fell again. You will never change”—or thoughts of presumption—“You are already going to confession, so what difference does one more sin make?” With these lies, Satan desires to increase your guilt by sinning more and strengthen your attachment to evil.
Ven. Louis of Granada writes that, because of the corruption of sin, we only “increase the difficulties” of conversion by delaying it (The Sinner’s Guide, chapter 24). Likewise, Pope St. Gregory the Great warns that although God has “promised pardon to the repentant, [he has] not promised tomorrow to the sinner” (Homily 12 on the Gospels, §6). Sirach likewise says, “Do not be so confident of atonement that you add sin to sin. . . . Do not delay to turn to the Lord” (Sir. 5:5-7).
True contrition is opposed to both extremes (presumption and despair): “Godly grief produces a repentance that leads to salvation . . . but worldly grief produces death” (2 Cor. 7:10). Recognizing your sin is already a movement of God’s grace, allowing you to turn back to him now.
Humble Yourself Before God
Having resolved to return to God, Scupoli next instructs to recognize the extent of your humiliation.
God, who is worthy of all our love, offers grace during every temptation to avoid sin. If we fall, it is not because God has failed us. As. Fr. Matthias Joseph Scheeben reflects, it is because we “disregard grace” in our temptations, we are “too deeply impressed” with transitory things, and we have only a “superficial knowledge of lasting heavenly riches” (The Glories of Divine Grace, 6).
Yet God has not completely abandoned you. Already, he draws you back to himself and offers you this opportunity to advance in humility. We can’t rely on our own strength or resolutions to avoid sin. Our Lord says, “Apart from me you can do nothing” (John 15:5). You might acknowledge: “See, O Master, what I am able to do. When I rely on my own strength, I commit nothing but sins” (The Spiritual Combat, 85).
Next, Scupoli says to praise God for his generosity in preventing another fall. Though you offended him, his mercy calls you to return to him. You could pray, “O Lord, I would not have stopped at this had not your goodness restrained me.”
Then, calmly name and condemn your “vicious passions, especially the one that has occasioned your fall.” What feelings or considerations motivated your sin? What occasion did you not avoid? Pope St. John Paul II teaches that acknowledging our faults and inclinations to sin is the “essential first step in returning to God” (Reconciliatio et Paenitentia 13). St. Francis de Sales says, “Victory does not lie in ignoring our infirmities, but in resisting them” (Introduction to the Devout Life, 15). Therefore, detest and reject these sins by contrition, which may be induced, according to Francis (16), by remembering that by sin, you have:
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- lost God’s grace,
- forfeited heaven,
- merited hell,
- renounced the eternal love of God.
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Entrust Yourself to Mercy
Having accepted the movements of grace to turn again toward God, have confidence in his infinite mercy and beg for his pardon. Fr. Scupoli gives us this prayer: “O Master, show forth thy divinity and pardon me! Never permit me to be separated from thee, deprived of thy help; never permit me to offend thee again” (The Spiritual Combat 85)
Having meditated on these things and resolving to repent and confess, many will trouble themselves wondering whether they have, through perfect contrition, gained forgiveness from God. But Scupoli strongly advises against this, calling it a “complete loss of time, an outcropping of pride, a spiritual sickness, an illusion of the devil.”
Instead, the soul should place itself into the merciful arms of God and “plunge into [its] usual duties as though nothing had happened.” This doesn’t mean that sin is trivial, nor that confession may be delayed carelessly, nor that you shouldn’t care whether your sins have been forgiven. It means that after turning back to God, resolving to confess, and entrusting ourselves to divine mercy, we shouldn’t be paralyzed by anxiety or scrutinizing the interior quality of our contrition: “Was that perfect contrition? Did I love God above all else for his own sake? Was I mostly afraid of hell? Should I try again?”
Forgiveness doesn’t depend upon feeling certain that you have been forgiven through perfect contrition. In fact, making that a condition for receiving forgiveness is condemned by the Council of Trent (Session 6, Canons 13-14). Our souls are often drawn back into reliance upon self by seeking to ground our security upon the perfection of our inner disposition. Reliance upon God discards this self-reliant presumption as a distraction from true devotion.
If the stings of conscience bring about doubt, insecurity, or anxiety, they can bend us back toward self. If they bring about humility, they inflame our devotion to God and are instruments of actual grace. There is a reason so many spiritual writers recommend a daily examination of conscience: because it is an efficient way of recognizing our daily patterns of sin and the occasions of these faults, but not to continually reopen previous wounds and arouse anxiety.
These steps are designed to draw us back from the slippery slope of sin, and it will take time to perfect ourselves. Francis De Sales compares the purification of the soul from sin to the purification of the body, because both “are accomplished little by little, progressing slowly and often hardly at all . . . [yet] a slow cure is a certain cure” (Introduction to the Devout Life, ch. 5). So take heart, entrust yourself to God through the remedy of Christ’s passion, and seek him always.