July 12th. As they sat together the elderly women were discussing Confession. “After the long lock-down when churches were closed, we are now being encouraged to go back to communion and to confession. I admit that I find it quite hard to go to confession.   What sins do we oldies really have to repent about, as we keep on hearing in the Old and the New Testament readings these days?”   “I thought about that too and spoke to my spiritual director. I now see that for me a sense of sin is what I feel when I have done something to break a relationship, with God or someone else.   For me it is not so much the act that you did but an inner sense that something, even one’s thoughts was wrong, bad or even evil. “

Scripture:   At that time Jesus began to upbraid the cities where most of his mighty works had been done because they did not repent. Matthew 11:20-24.  Pope Francis:  I would like to offer Christians a few suggestions for an ecological spirituality.   Admittedly Christians have not always appropriated and developed the spiritual treasures bestowed by God upon the Church where the life of the Spirit is not dissociated from the body or from nature or from worldly realities, but lived in and within them, in communion with all that surrounds us.   LS 216