Why?

When we are sick, we go to the doctor.  We go because we want to know why we are sick and how we are to become well.  We ask questions and we listen to her advice, and we follow through and take the steps needed to become well again.

When our cars give problems, we take them to the mechanic.  We ask questions and we listen to his advice and hand over the money so he will fix it. It hurts, but we do it because we want the cars to run right.

We recognize when we are physically ill and when our cars need repair, so why can we not see our own sinfulness and take the steps to clear our consciences and be free of our offenses against God and our neighbor?

Why do we, every week, carry our burdens of sin into church and out again without taking the steps to have them removed?  We go through the motions of singing hymns, taking communion, praying, and listening to sermons, then we continue on with the same old sins and habits that are detrimental to our spiritual health.

The answer came to me when I read an article, yesterday, about three women who worked for Douglas Karpen, the notorious abortionist in Texas.  They all witnessed this man’s methods of pulling out alive babies, wrenching their necks as though they were just farm chickens on slaughtering day. They saw the man throw the babies into the trash can and they did nothing, because they thought it was legal!

One of the assistants said, “I thought, well, it’s an abortion you know, that’s what he does, but I wasn’t aware that it was illegal…Most of the time we would see him where the fetus would come completely out and of course, the fetus would still be alive.”

Maybe too many of us think this way; that if some action or activity is declared legal by our courts or our congress, by golly it must be right. Or maybe too many of us assume that our pet habits are right because they feel right. Feeling right about something takes precedence in our minds regardless of what the Bible says and what the Church teaches.

So we carry on supporting and practicing whatever we want because it’s legal and it feels right. Our burdens become too heavy to carry, but instead of confessing our sins, we work to legalize more of them in hopes that we will feel good.

This ramble I have written has just answered another question I have been pondering for some time: Why is the pharmaceutical industry booming and why is there a drug store on every corner of every city in this country?