← The Catechism in a Year (with Fr. Mike Schmitz)
The Catechism in a Year (with Fr. Mike Schmitz)
Day 196: Conversion of the Baptized (2025)
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We continue our examination of the Sacrament of Penance and Reconciliation. Fr. Mike explores that interior conversion, or conversion of the heart, is a radical reorientation of our whole life. Conversion is so much more than just going through the motions or checking off the boxes. He emphasizes that interior conversion and repentance requires an active hatred for sin. Today’s readings are Catechism paragraphs 1427-1433.
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Hi, my name is Fr. Mike Schmitz and you're listening to the Catechism in a Year podcast where we encounter God's plan of sheer goodness for us revealed in Scripture and passed down through the tradition of the Catholic faith. The Catechism in the Year is brought to you by ascension. In 365 days, we'll read through the Catechism of the Catholic Church, discovering our identity in God's family as we journey together toward our heavenly home. This is day 196. We're reading paragraphs 1427 to 1433. As always, I am using the Ascension edition of the Catechism, which includes the Foundations of Faith approach. But you can follow along with any recent version of the Catechism of the Catholic Church. You can also download your own catechism in your reading plan by visiting ascensionpress.com ciy and you can click follow or subscribe on your podcast app for daily updates and daily notifications. Does today is day 196. We're closing in on that, that 200, the historic, mythical, fabled 200 mark. We are getting closer and closer by the day today. 196. Okay, you guys, so yesterday we started talking about the Sacrament of reconciliation and sacrament of conversion, Sacrament of penance, confession, forgiveness, as we said, reconciliation. But today we're going to highlight the reality that this is truly a call to conversion. Every time we approach the Lord, we're called to convert, right? We're called to transform our minds. Metanoia is that Greek word which means a transformation of the mind that changed the way not just we act, not just in our external behaviors, but. But to allow our hearts to be changed, our minds to be changed, to allow ourselves really, truly where we find ourselves deeply in our hearts, that to be changed. So we're talking today about the conversion of the baptized, right? So obviously there's a call to conversion by everybody, for everybody, to by Jesus, for everybody before baptism, but also after conversion. After baptism, we're called to continually be converted. That's the second conversion we're going to talk about today, as well as interior penance and that recognition. Again, interior penance is a radical reorientation of our whole life. If you want to have a definition, that's it. That's what it is. That's what the Catechism offers us in 1431. Interior repentance is a radical reorientation of our whole life. So that's what we're going to talk about today. It's a challenge. And so let's call upon the Lord and just ask for his help today. Father in heaven, we give you praise, we thank you, we give you glory. You are good. You are God. And you call us. You call us not just to be good. You call us to be like you. You don't just call us to say no to certain things in our lives. You call us to say no to our very selves. You call us to deny ourselves, pick up our cross and follow after you. Help us to have hearts that are like your heart. Help us to love what you love. Help us to hate what you hate. Help us to be like you. Ask this in the mighty name of Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen. In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. It is day 196. We are reading paragraphs 1427. To the conversion of the baptized Jesus calls to conversion. This call is an essential part of the proclamation of the kingdom. The time is fulfilled and the kingdom of God is at hand. Repent and believe in the Gospel. In the church's preaching, this call is addressed first to those who do not yet know Christ and his Gospel. Also. Baptism is the principal place for the first and fundamental conversion. It is by faith in the gospel and by baptism that one renounces evil and gains salvation, that is, the forgiveness of all sins and the gift of new life. Christ's call to conversion continues to resound in the lives of Christians. This second conversion is an uninterrupted task for the whole church, who, clasping sinners to her bosom, is at once holy and always in need of purification, and follows constantly the path of penance and renewal. This endeavor of conversion is not just a human work. It is the movement of a contrite heart, drawn and moved by grace, to respond to the merciful love of a God who loved us first. St Peter's conversion, after he had denied his master three times, bears witness to this. Jesus look of infinite mercy, drew tears of repentance from Peter, and after the Lord's resurrection, a threefold affirmation of love for him. The second conversion also has a communitarian dimension, as is clear in the Lord's call to a whole repent. St. Ambrose says of the two conversions that in the church there are water and tears, the water of baptism and the tears of repentance, interior penance. Jesus call to conversion and penance, like that of the prophets before him, does not aim first at outward works, so sackcloth and ashes, fasting and mortification, but at the conversion of the heart. Interior conversion. Without this, such penances remain sterile and false. However, interior conversion urges expression in visible signs, gestures and works of penance. Interior repentance is a radical reorientation of our whole life, a return, a conversion to God with all our heart, an end of sin, a turning away from evil with repugnance toward the evil actions we have committed. At the same time, it entails the desire and resolution to change one's life with hope in God's mercy and trust in the help of his grace. This conversion of heart is accompanied by a salutary pain and sadness which the Fathers called anime croceatis, Affliction of spirit and compunctio cordis. Repentance of heart. The human heart is heavy and hardened. God must give man a new heart. Conversion is first of all a work of the grace of God, who makes our hearts return to Him. Restore us to thyself, O Lord, that we may be restored. God gives us the strength to begin anew. It is in discovering the greatness of God's love that our heart is shaken by the horror and weight of sin and begins to fear offending God by sin and being separated from Him. The human heart is converted by looking upon him whom our sins have pierced. As Saint Clement of Rome stated, let us fix our eyes on Christ's blood and understand how precious it is to His Father, for poured out for our salvation, it has brought to the whole world the grace of repentance. Since Easter, the Holy Spirit has proved the world wrong about sin. That is, proved that the world has not believed in him whom the Father has sent. But this same Spirit who brings sin to light is also the consoler who gives the human heart grace for repentance and conversion. Gosh, you guys. Today, here we are. Day 196, paragraphs 1427 to 1433. This just. I don't know if you are getting the sense. It is beautiful, powerful, convicting that recognition that here we are, all of us, whether you are baptized or not, we are called to be converted. We are called to deny ourselves, pick up our cross and follow after Jesus. We are called here it is to renounce evil and gain salvation. This is the paragraph 1427 that Jesus calls us to conversion. And I love this. There's the first group of people who have never met Christ, never encountered the Gospel. That's the first conversion. And of course, where we experience that conversion, where it really happens, where this change happens is by faith in the Gospel and baptism. What do we do? There we Renounce evil and we gain salvation. But then this next step is probably where a lot of us find ourselves in paragraph 1428 and following where Jesus continues this call, right, to, to. To have our hearts radically reoriented continues in the lives of, of all of us, in lives of Christians. It says here in 1428 that this is an uninterrupted task for the whole church. Now, to think about this for a second, you know, you can say, when's your conversion happen? You know, this is something we say. You know, we. When I talk to our students, a lot of times they have an encounter with the Lord that, that radically reorients and lives. And so they'll talk about, well, I had my first conversion here, or I had a second deeper conversion later on. You know, in fact, there's one of our focus missionaries now, she works with us here at umd. She'll say things like, well, my first conversion in college, my first conversion was I was converted to the community that I found, right? I met this group of Catholic Christians who loved the Lord. So that was her first encounter of Jesus was in community. And then she said, I was in that community. And then a year later, that's what she said. I had a conversion to, to Jesus in the Eucharist. It was noting she was using the same word conversion to identify these movements of her heart. Like a radical reorientation from solo, I'm just kind of doing my life on my own to, oh, I'm part of the Catholic Church. And then later on is, okay, I'm living my life. And then later on too, in the Eucharist, oh, wow, I have found the source of my life. And now I'm going to center my life around him, around Jesus in the Eucharist. And so this conversion, right, is a radical reorientation. We talked about that in paragraph 1431. Interior repentance is a radical reorientation of our whole life. And this is, as it says, an uninterrupted task for the whole church. And of course, this is not just an exterior work. It's not just a human work. In fact, it says here that, yes, there are sackcloth and ashes, there's fasting and mortification. Those things actually are present, of course. But the thing the Gospels are oriented towards, though even the prophets are oriented towards, though Jesus call of conversion is oriented towards, is the conversion of the heart, right? Interior conversion. Because I do all the things, like I go through all the steps, I check all the boxes, and sometimes that's what it can look like our faith is right. Sometimes our faith feels like I am literally just going through the motions. I'm checking off the boxes. You said that I needed to go to confession at least once a year or when I've. Yeah. Experienced mortals saying, you said that I need to receive Holy Communion at least once a year. I go to have mass every Sunday. Okay, fine. I'm doing those things. I'm checking the boxes. I'm going through the motions. As it says here in the catechism, those actions, including all penances, remain sterile and false without interior conversion, without changing our heart or even say this, allowing our hearts to be changed. Let's look at this. How many times do we go into prayer expecting to leave prayer changed? How many times do you and I show up for Mass and we actually anticipate, by the end of this Mass, I will be different. By the end of this Mass, my life will be altered. Now, maybe not radically re Altered, but at the same time, like, I'm expecting that by the time I get to the end of this Mass, I'll be different. I'll be changed versus how. I think a lot of us show up. I think a lot of us, we tend to show up and say, okay, this I'm. And even if we're happy to be there, like, even if we know that here I am to worship, we know that the heart of religion is worship. Heart of worship is sacrifice. I'm here to have communion with Jesus in the Eucharist. Yeah, I'm here to pray. But how many of us show up not expecting at all that by the end of this Mass, by the end of this prayer time, I'll be changed? God will have altered my heart. He will have done something in me that is new. And yet that's our call. Remember, the second conversion is an uninterrupted task for the whole church at all times. We are called. And not only that, it's an act of grace. We recognize this. It is an act of grace to love the Lord with all of our heart. That we can't do that on our own. None of us can do that on our own. We need God's help to even turn to God. It's nuts. Empirical 1431 goes on to say, so what does that conversion look like? Okay, well, turn to God with all our heart. Okay. And end of sin, that's part of conversion. And end of sin is not just falling more and more in love with Jesus. It's also letting our actions be changed. And end of sin turning away from Evil with repugnance towards evil, actions we've committed. That's a critical part of conversion, is a hatred for sin. You know, of course, sometimes what can happen to us, we can be tempted in our looking back over our lives, we can be tempted to beat ourselves up over our past sins. Now, there's a big difference between learning from one's past and living in one's past, right? There's a difference between being stuck back there and continue. Whenever my mind goes to that I beat myself up versus I go back and I say, lord, I once again renounce that sin. Lord, I once again let it go. I once again place it under your dominion. This is one of the prayers that you and I can make. You know, I think probably a lot of us will look back over our past and maybe that past is more recent than we'd like, but to look back at our sins and say, okay, God, I can't do anything to change that. This is what I've chosen. This is what I've done. This is part of my story. I place that, that part of my story. I place that sin. I place that evil under your dominion. I let you, God, be the Lord, not only of my present and my future, I let you, God, be the Lord of my past, be the Lord of that brokenness, be the Lord of the wounds that I can't go back and undo. I place them under your dominion. And that's so, so powerful that helps us have a repugnance for sin. To not live in the past, but to learn from the past and move forward. It goes on to say, at the same time, this conversion entails the desire and resolution to change one's life. The desire and resolution to change one's life. You know, sometimes we're going to talk about going to confession in the next couple days. Duh. This is the section about that, about confession. When we go to confession, we have to have, at least at the minimum, we have to have some desire to change from sin to grace, right? We have to have some kind of desire to turn away from sin and to resolve to live a life of grace. And so that's part of conversion here. It says this. It goes on to say, with what? With hope in God's mercy and trust in the help of his grace. And, you know, I know I'm going line through line here, or word by word. It's so important because every word matters. They mean something so important. So, yes, I have a desire and resolution to change my life, but I need this. I need Hope in God's mercy and trust in the help of his grace. Because if you've ever gone to confession once, you probably have gone to confession more than once. And if you've gone to confession more than once, you've probably gone to confession for the same thing more than once. And so it's really easy to get discouraged, to become despairing, maybe even over, can I really change? Do I even. Really, do I? You maybe even as you're listening to this, you might even think, wow, do I even desire to change? Do I even desire God's life? Do I even desire this? Because I keep turning back to this sin. What does that mean about my heart? Well, it means you have a broken heart. That's just. That's us. We talked about concupiscence the other day. This being, I'm inclined to sin. There's things in my life that shouldn't be. There's things in my life that are evil, and I want them. That's crazy, but that's me. And so I need hope in God's mercy and trust in the help of his grace. Or else I'll be so discouraged by looking at my own sins, so discouraged looking at my own faults in the way that I continue to mess up in the same old ways that I might just give up. And here's the truth. We must never give up. You must never give up. We have. Part of conversion is hope in God's mercy and trust in the help of his grace. And yes, it will cause a pain in our heart, right? That's the compunction. Salutary pain and sadness, that's the hurt. But better to have a heart that's hurt than a heart that's hardened. This is so important for us. It's better to have a heart that's hurt by our sadness over our sins, our grief over our sins, than a heart that is hardened. Paragraph 1432 says, the human heart is heavy and hardened. Therefore we have to have a new heart. And so God's grace makes our hearts return to Him. God's grace gives us a new heart. I love this. It is in discovering the greatness of God's love that our heart is shaken by the horror and weight of sin and begins to fear offending God by sin and being separated from Him. This is so important. Wow. Discovering the greatness of God's love. Our heart becomes shaken by the horror and weight of sin and moves us to do what? Moves us to love God, to hate sin, and to love God even more. Again, we said at the beginning of this day. That the goal of the Christian life is not just to become good, not just to become a nicer person or less jerky. The goal of the Christian life is to become like Jesus. The goal of the Christian life is to become like the Father. That is an act of grace. But to become like the Father, I have to turn away from the things that he hates. Right? To become like the Son, Jesus, our Lord and Savior, I have to turn away. I have to make the decision. I have to desire and resolve to turn away from the things that make my heart not like His. And this is the work of a lifetime. Therefore. Therefore be patient. Be patient with yourself. Be patient with yourself. Because this is the work of a lifetime. At the same time, be patient, but do not procrastinate. Be patient, but act now. There is no time like the present. All we have is now. So in this moment I invite us all to call to mind what are the things in my life that have led me away from Jesus. What are the things in my life that if they stay there, I will never be like Him. And to even now say, Jesus in your name, I repent of the sin. Even right now, wherever you are, be able to pray that prayer. Jesus, in your name, I repent of. Name the sin in the name of Jesus. I renounce this sin in the name of Jesus. I even renounce the thing that leads me to this sin in the name of Jesus. I renounce the curiosity that brings me to this sin in the name of Jesus. I renounce the situations that bring me to this sin in the name of Jesus, I renounce the near occasion of sin Right now. I invite you, as you come to the end of this episode today. Day 196 just take a moment to pray. I know you might want to go on to the next thing, but just take a moment to pray. This is going to be the uninterrupted task of our lives. The second conversion. And in that prayer in the name of Jesus, I renounce whatever that sin is. Let that be our prayer. Today I am praying for you. Please pray for me. My name is Father Mike. I cannot wait to see you tomorrow. God bless.