Jul 14 Mon
Have I become accustomed to sin?
“If anyone had a healthy sense of smell in his soul, he would perceive the stench of his sins.”
This phrase of St. Augustine (Commentary on Psalm 37:9) may seem clear, but it says more than it looks.
He begins telling us about a sense that we do not have very developed: "The smell of the soul." Today, sin seems to have disappeared from our vocabulary. We hardly think that something can be a sin. That is, we have lost the ability to smell the damage we do to ourselves when we forget God's Will, or adjust it to our tastes and preferences.
Augustine describes the soul’s sense of smell as an internal, spiritual, and moral faculty of the human being. It is not a physical sense, of course, but the soul's ability to discern, recognize, and react to certain realities. It is like a spiritual sensitivity that allows the individual to grasp what is good and what is bad.
It is common to perceive sin as an offense to God, but we forget that it is also an offense to ourselves. By describing sin as a "stench," St. Augustine attributes to it an unpleasant quality that is perceived by those who have a clear conscience and a healthy relationship with God. The stench is something we instinctively reject. We reject it because our nature recognizes in it a danger and pain to us. By associating stench with sin, its corrupting and harmful character is emphasized.
St. Augustine suggests that a "healthy" soul always maintains its purity and its capacity for moral discernment. This soul has not become accustomed to evil, nor has it normalized it. On the contrary, his sensitivity allows him to detect the filth of sin, even when others may be insensible to it or justify it. Sin is not something neutral or desirable, but something that, in essence, is contrary to our true nature and therefore generates a reaction of aversion in a wholesome soul.
Then Augustine reminds us of the need for purification. If sin has a stench, this also suggests the need for purification and healing for the soul that has become contaminated or has lost that sensitivity. The restoration of the soul’s "sense of smell" involves a process of repentance, confession, and seeking divine grace.
With this powerful image, St. Augustine reveals the need for an awakened moral conscience and a deep interior life to recognize the true nature of sin and its negative consequences for us.
Is my "sense of smell of my soul" still capable of perceiving the stench of sin? Or, have I become accustomed to sin? Questions that we should ask ourselves from time to time.
The reality of sin, rather than discouraging us, should spur us on to fight.
“God, who is all-powerful and merciful, has given us all the necessary means for making good our mistakes. All we have to do is use them, and keep using them, always ready to start again, and never becoming demoralized. Do you not know that in a race, all the runners compete, but only one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain it."