St. John Vianney’s Preaching on Authentic Repentance

08-04-2024Weekly ReflectionJen Arnold, M.A.

Today, the Church celebrates the feast day of St. John Marie Vianney, so I thought it would be fitting to recognize him and pay him homage as an outstanding preacher.

St. John Vianney (1786-1859) lived through the French Revolution and its aftermath. It was a tumultuous time for France at large, but also specifically for the Catholic Church. The revolution carried a strong anti-Catholic sentiment with its objective of abolishing the Catholic monarchy. The Church was suppressed, and priests were forced to operate in secret under the threat of persecution and death. The bravery of these priests greatly affected St. John, and their heroic efforts helped to shape his own ministerial work as a priest. During the suppression of the Church, people lost broad access to the sacraments, Mass, and catechetical formation.

As a result, after the Church was re-established in 1809, a sense of lukewarmness crept into the population along with a relaxed approach to moral life. By the time St. John was ordained a priest, he was convicted in his heart to help as many souls as possible avoid damnation because of their lukewarmness. With that singular goal, he became known for two things: offering the Sacrament of Reconciliation for 10-16 hours at a time and preaching hard-hitting sermons revealing the evils of sin with clear prescriptions for getting to heaven. People were hungry for the truth, and it is reported that each year, toward the end of his life and public ministry, 20,000 pilgrims came to see him and hear him preach. He is now honored as the patron of parish priests and confessors.

I would like to introduce and summarize a selection from The Sermons of the Cure D’Ars, St. John Marie Vianney: For the Sundays and Feasts of the Year. Admittedly, it was difficult for me to choose only one because they are all very good, so it would be worthwhile to read some additional homilies if you are inspired to do so. For now, we will look at what he had to say about authentic repentance.

St. John was known for refusing absolution to people if he believed their repentance was insincere. He knew he was not doing a soul any favors by simply going through the motions, which would have resulted in a person persisting in his or her sins. He believed it was more charitable to direct a soul down a path to heaven by insisting on the type of repentance that moves the heart to conversion and an amendment of life. As a further act of charity, he made sure to preach about genuine repentance to lead his flock to making better confessions and leading a moral life.

Before getting into the nuts and bolts of repentance, St. John opens his sermon with reasons why we should have it. The first reason we should repent of our sins is that when we are like the prodigal son, our joyful Father wants us back in his merciful arms. If we understood how much sin damages our relationship with God and that repenting restores our relationship with him, we would be much quicker to detest sin as much as he does. The second reason for authentic repentance is a better, more proper understanding of what Jesus suffered for our sins. Here, St. John uses vivid language to stir up emotion in the heart:

Oh, if I could only lead you to the foot of the cross which is still reddened with the precious blood of our Lord, shed to wash away our sins! Oh, if I could only lead you into that garden of sorrow, where our Lord shed for our sins, not ordinary tears, but blood, which flowed forth from all the pores of his body! Oh, if I could only show Him to you laden with the cross, staggering along the streets of Jerusalem, at every step He stumbles and is driven on by kicks. Oh, if I could only lead you to Mount Calvary, where our Lord died for the sake of our salvation.

Hopefully, most of us are moved by this imagery, at least to some degree. Still, St. John states that a heart hardened by years of living a sinful life without repentance becomes desensitized to the reality of what Jesus endured for us. It becomes more difficult to know if we are experiencing authentic repentance. He laments, “Oh, my God, how many Christians there are who will discover at the hour of their death nothing but invalid confessions!”

Fortunately, both for his parishioners and for us, St. John didn't end his sermon there. He continued that, repentance is an “anguish of soul” that will cause us to weep over our sins in this world or the next. Our tears will wash away our sins if we shed them in this life, but not in the next. To recognize if you are experiencing this type of anguish of the soul, St. John Vianney says your repentance will have four qualities.

“The first quality is that it must come from the bottom of the heart.” St. John tells us that, while shedding real tears can be a good sign, they are not necessarily the most reliable sign of authentic repentance. He reports that many people weep in the confessional but then return to their sinful lives immediately. So, when you cry over your sins, are you experiencing deep suffering in your heart over what you’ve done in offense to God? “Therefore, if our heart is guilty, the heart must suffer, or God will never forgive us.”

“The second quality of this anguish which we must feel over our sins, is that it must be supernatural; that means, that the Holy Ghost and not natural causes must call it forth.” St. John says shame, fear of earthly consequences, or the misfortune sin causes are insufficient for repentance. Those are all natural causes for sorrow and not worthy of God’s mercy in and of themselves. Supernatural sorrow lies in the realization that to be in Hell is to be eternally separated from God. Temporal punishment is nothing compared to eternal punishment, so the supernatural implications should motivate repentance.

“The third quality of repentance is that it must be unlimited, that is, the anguish it calls forth must be greater than any other sorrow…” St. John tells us that there is nothing we can lose — loved ones, health, financial stability, success — that will cause us more pain than “a sin which deprives us of all the glories of heaven, alienates our dear Lord from us, and casts us into hell, which is the greatest of all misfortunes.” This may be more difficult in our modern society than at any other time. We live in a materialistic world that doesn’t believe in things like heaven, or especially, hell, so people are very attached to things of the world. We don’t like losing the good things we have, and we are sad when we do. St. John implores us to order our sense of priorities by placing the loss of heaven at the very top.

“The fourth and last quality is that repentance must be comprehensive.” This means that we must repent of all our sins equally. We cannot receive pardon for one sin if we lack authentic repentance for all our other sins. He says that we can see comprehensive repentance when we study the lives of the saints, and he often references St. Augustine, who is repulsed when he reflects on his former way of life before his conversion. Regardless of whether they are mortal or venial, do all our sins equally repulse us to the same degree?

St. John Vianney concludes by telling us to ask God for the grace of true repentance and to take time for self-reflection and examination. He reminds us that God wants to forgive us and to receive us into his arms like little children, so he will help us when we are humble and contrite. Let’s take his advice to heart, examine our hearts while considering the four qualities of authentic repentance, and take steps to renew or resolve our commitment to turn away from our sins.