A sacrifice to God is a contrite spirit
- ST. AUGUSTINE
I acknowledge my transgression, says David.
If I admit my fault, then you will pardon it. Let us never assume that if we live good lives we will be without sin; our lives should be praised only when we continue to beg for pardon.
But men are hopeless creatures, and the less they concentrate on their own sins, the more interested they become in the sins of others. They seek to criticise, not to correct. Unable to excuse themselves, they are ready to accuse others.
This was not the way that David showed us how to pray and make amends to God, when he said: I acknowledge my transgression, and my sin is ever before me. He did not concentrate on others' sins; he turned his thoughts on himself. He did not merely stroke the surface, but he plunged inside and went deep down within himself. He did not spare himself, and therefore was not impudent in asking to be spared.
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Acknowledgement
Saint Augustine. "A sacrifice to God is a contrite spirit." from a sermon.
This excerpt is in the Office of Readings for the Fourteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time.
The Author
St. Augustine, known as Augustine of Hippo (354-430), is the greatest of the Latin Church fathers. His Confessions (400) is a classic of world literature and a spiritual autobiography as well as an original work of philosophy. The City of God (412-27) is a monumental work of 22 books which presents human history in terms of the conflict between the spiritual and the temporal, which will end in the triumph of the City of God, whose manifestation on earth is the Church.
