Sincerity, Love for Truth

By Fr. Conor Donnelly

(Proofread)

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

My Lord and my God, I firmly believe that you are here, that you see me, that you hear me. I adore you with profound reverence. I ask your pardon for my sins and grace to make this time of prayer fruitful. My Immaculate Mother, Saint Joseph, my father and lord, my guardian angel, intercede for me.

We are told in the Gospel of today, “Behold, a true Israelite, in whom there is no guile” (John 1:47).

It's not often that Our Lord compliments any of the apostles. On this occasion, He does so, and He shows us the great esteem He had for that clarity, that transparency, that simplicity that there was in Nathanael—Nathanael who is Bartholomew.

Our Lord loved truth. God is truth. One of the things that He wants us to love in our life is the truth—first and foremost, the truth about ourselves, the truth about ideas, the truth that is reflected in various things. We could ask Our Lord for that grace to grow in our love for the truth, and that we might manifest that truth in all sorts of ways.

One of the things that really irritated Our Lord with the Pharisees was their duplicity. They said one thing, but they did another. They weren't clear or transparent. There was one thing on the outside and there was something else on the inside.

Our Lord says, “Be careful not to parade your uprightness in public to attract attention; otherwise, you will lose all reward from your Father in heaven. When you give alms, do not have it trumpeted before you. This is what the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, to win human admiration. In truth, I tell you, they have had their reward” (Matt. 6:1-2).

Our Lord has no time for human admiration. He invites us to reject human respect: thinking about what other people will think about us, or being worried or concerned about such things.

He invites us to have divine respect and to be concerned about what God may think of us, because God reads the heart.

And when He read the heart of the Pharisees, He saw all sorts of terrible things: “You brood of vipers! You whitewashed walls!” (cf. Matt. 23:27).

He had no time for them. He invites us to have the sincerity and the simplicity of little children. Sine cera means without wax—knowing the truth in all its reality.

In other moments, He has warned us about all the evil things that are lurking there in the human heart: anger, envy, jealousy, lust, gluttony, sloth (cf. Mark 7:21-23). We know this is the reality.

The virtue of sincerity means that we try and get out all those bad things. We bring them out into the light of another's judgment, through spiritual direction or other means. We get out all the badness that's there inside us so that God can fill us with His grace. Part of that is knowing how to speak, knowing how to talk about these things.

“They brought to him a deaf man who had an impediment in his speech; and they asked him to lay his hand on him. He took him aside to be by themselves, away from the crowd, put his fingers into the man's ears, and touched his tongue with spittle. Then looking up to heaven, he sighed and said, Ephphatha, which means, ‘Be opened.’ And his ears were opened, and at once the impediment of his tongue was loosened and he spoke clearly” (Mark 7:32-35).

We need to ask Our Lord for the grace to speak clearly, to be able to reflect the truth in all that we do. “Let your ‘yes’ be yes and your ‘no’ be no” (Matt. 5:37).

In St. John, we're told, “You shall know the truth, and the truth will make you free” (John 8:32). The liberating effect of truth. Our Lord wants us to be imbued through and through with this truth. “I am the way, the truth, and the life” (John 14:6).

We need to ask for a greater love for the truth. That truth will be manifested in everything we say and everything we do.

Little children see the truth. They have a special eye that sees through things.

You've probably heard the story of the man in Alexandria in Egypt who trained his monkey to dance very well. The monkey danced so well that the man decided to dress up the monkey as a beautiful lady and bring her to the ball.

He brought this dressed-up monkey looking like a beautiful lady to the ball, and the monkey danced majestically. Everybody at the ball was wondering: Who is this wonderful lady who dances so well? Everybody wanted to dance with her.

But there was a little kid there who suspected there was something funny about this lady; something that was a bit different. The little kid had a few peanuts, so the kid rolled a few peanuts on the floor.

As soon as the monkey saw the peanuts, the monkey pulled off the mask and dived for the peanuts. The truth was out. All it took was a little kid and a few peanuts.

The devil knows where to catch us out. He knows what sort of temptation to roll in front of us so that our true nature, that ugly wounded human nature on the inside, comes out, that nature with its tendency to sin.

That's the truth of our wounded human nature that Our Lord wants us to face, to talk about, to fight against, so that we can be transformed into Christ.

It's a necessary step along the pathway to holiness: to face that truth about ourselves, to try and see ourselves as God sees us, the reality, warts and all. Then can begin the process of our sanctification.

“One Sabbath day he was teaching in one of the synagogues, and there was before him a woman who for eighteen years had been possessed by a spirit that crippled her. She was bent double and quite unable to stand upright. When Jesus saw her, he called her over and said, ‘Woman, you are freed from your disability.’ And he laid his hands on her, and at once she straightened up and she glorified God” (Luke 13:10-13).

If we don't manage to get out the truth—the ugly things that are there on the inside—we become a little bit like this bent-over lady who couldn't straighten herself up.

God wants us to be able to be upright, to be straight, to work the process of our sanctity out, so that we can practice all the virtues in the way that He wants us to.

First and foremost, we have to be sincere with God. We are always in His presence. We need to have a two-way conversation, face-to-face, without hiding ourselves in anonymity, contemplating the life of Jesus Christ who is our only model.

Sincerity with God in prayer: “The Pharisee, when he went up to the temple to pray, said, “I thank you, Lord, that I am not like the rest of men...I fast twice a day, I give tithes of all I own, I do this, I do that” (cf. Luke 18:11-12).

He was tapping himself on the back for all the good things that he did. But he didn't see the extent of his pride. He was full of comparisons, criticisms, lording it over others. “I thank you that I am not like this publican.”

Our Lord teaches us about humility in prayer. The truth about our prayer. The truth about our interior thoughts, all the things that are going on in our hearts.

Fulton Sheen says, “The quickest way to discover our predominant fault is to ask ourselves: what do I think about most when I am alone? Where do my thoughts go when I let them go spontaneously? What makes me most unhappy when I don't have it? Most glad when I possess it? What fault irritates me most when I am accused of it? And which sin do I most vigorously deny possessing?”

This leads to an examination of conscience, which really is an examination of our life, which really is an examination of our heart. What do I think about? Where do my thoughts go? What am I like on the inside?”

Sine cera, without wax. He says, “No spiritual progress can be made until the master fault is dug up from its hiding place, brought into the light, and laid before God. For until the position of the enemy is known, he cannot be attacked” (Fulton J. Sheen, On Being Human).

That's a very interesting strategy, if you know the enemy. What are the peanuts that the devil rolls in front of us for our true selves to come out? Egoism, selfishness, laziness, love of comfort.

St. John in his Letter says, “If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves; and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just. He will forgive our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:8-9).

Our Lord is waiting for that truthfulness. He loves the truth in us. He wants us to be open, transparent, clear.

That sort of person is immensely attractive to other people. You know what sort of person they are, what they are on the inside. Their ‘yes’ is yes and their ‘no’ is no. Their word is their bond. Solid people through and through.

Our formation is to lead us to be that sort of person, and to use all the means to help to bring that about.

Lord, help me to be honest in my moments of examination, to take good care of those moments, to listen to the Holy Spirit as He perhaps opens my eyes to things I never saw before, but which possibly may be very clear to other people.

One of the aspects of our pride is that we don't see our greatest faults, but other people see them—and often with great clarity.

Little children see things. A little girl was accompanying her mum one day when the mother was combing her hair. The little girl asked, “Mum, why are some of your hairs gray?”

The mother said, “You see, every time that you do something naughty one of my hairs turns gray.”

The child was silent for a moment. Then she said, “Why are Grandma's hairs all gray?”

Children have that clarity of vision. They see through things.

“At that hour, the disciples came to Jesus saying, ‘Who do you think is the greater in the kingdom of heaven?’ And Jesus, calling unto him a little child, set him in the midst of them and said, ‘Amen, amen, I say to you, unless you be converted and become as little children, you shall not enter the kingdom of heaven. Whoever shall humble himself as this little child, he is the greater in the kingdom of heaven’” (Matt. 18:1-4).

All the time, Our Lord talks about the simplicity and sincerity of children who speak the truth, who know the truth, who have a great sense of the lie.

Sometimes, as we grow older, we can sort of take lies for granted a little bit. But the gravity of lies can't escape us. We should remind ourselves that “the devil is the father of lies” (John 8:44).

When you hear the confessions of little children, sometimes it's very edifying to hear the kids say, ‘I told a lie.’ There's a great weight on their shoulders, on their conscience. They have a great sense of the lie. ‘I did something bad—I told a lie.’

We could ask Our Lord that there might be no lies in our life. We might make a resolution never to tell a lie for the rest of our life, because we want to live by the truth; that no word of falsity would ever pass our lips.

We're told in the Furrow, “Apply a savage sincerity to your examination of conscience; that is to say, be courageous. It is the same as when you look at yourself in the mirror to know where you've hurt yourself or where the dirt is or where your blemishes are, so that you can get rid of them” (Josemaría Escrivá, Furrow, Point 148).

So the words of today's Gospel could ring in our ears frequently. “Behold, an Israelite, in whom there is no guile.” He's clear, he's true through and through. There's no duplicity.

This is the sort of soul that I want. This is the apostle that I want. Sincerity with God, sincerity with ourselves in our examination of conscience.

And then, sincerity with others, so that at the right moment, in the right place, with the right persons, we’ll speak the truth, which sometimes may be shameful, embarrassing.

The thoughts that go through our mind, our imagination; the interior weakness that's there; the wounded human nature—that's what we're invited to bring out into the open through the virtue of sincerity in spiritual direction.

If we want to practice this virtue—a virtue is a repeated good action, it's a good habit—then it's very good to get into the habit, every time we go to Confession or spiritual direction, to say something that costs us a little bit. All virtues have to cost a little bit.

All the virtues can always be growing in the course of our life, so that we come to live this particular virtue a little better.

If we practice that virtue in a regular way, living that habit of sincerity each week, then it's as though we keep the channels open. We're ready to get something out. We’ll find it easier if someday there is something particularly difficult to talk about.

The devil would love us to be overcome by irrational reasons. Our reason can very easily become irrational. But God wants us to have a clear conscience, clear ideas. Somebody said once the softest pillow to lie down on at night is a clear conscience.

God will give us the grace to practice this virtue, particularly when it's difficult. We know from experience that's the way to restore our peace and our serenity. It can be a great act of humility.

“God resists the proud, but he gives his grace to the humble” (James 4:6; Ps. 138:6). That manifestation of humility can be an indispensable condition to get grace from God.

Each week we need to seek the way to practice this virtue; sometimes saying first the things that cost us the most; asking Our Lord for the grace to grow in our self-knowledge, so that with the passage of time we know ourselves a little better; to live responsibility; admit the way we are and the way we do things; face up to the truth about ourselves.

That helps us to encounter God then in our work, in our personal prayer. It helps us not to seek excuses in my character, in the weather, in my hormones, in the devil, in all sorts of things.

One writer said, “Excuses are the nails that build a house of failure” (Don Wilder, Excuses for All Occasions). Excuses—many of the saints didn't accept excuses. You have to look at the truth and go to the real reasons.

Pope St. John Paul II said, “Through this simplicity and clarity one can construct the unity of the Kingdom of God. This unity is at the same time a mature interior unity of each person.”

Over time, grace and formation help us to grow to have that interior maturity. Deep spiritual soul.

He says, “It's the foundation of the unity of spouses and families. It's the strength of societies. Those societies perhaps already feel more each time how an attempt is being made to destroy them from the inside, calling good evil and sin a sign of progress and liberation. The devil turns things upside down.”

Truth is the basis of unity. When two people speak the truth all the time, then you can trust that person. The truth builds trust and trust builds loyalty. Loyalty to God. Loyalty to the Church. Loyalty to our Christian vocation.

We may see a great tendency in society not to call things by their names; find all sorts of other words or euphemisms to water down the reality of sin. The greatest evil is sin, not all sorts of other things like lack of material possessions, or lack of this character, or this grace, or whatever.

We're constantly assaulted by the enemies of our souls: pride, vanity, laziness, sensuality, anger, envy, avarice, intemperance. We need to admit that sometimes we lend an ear to all of these enemies.

Benedict XVI said, “To console us, the Lord has also given us these parables of the net with the good fish and the bad fish, or the field where the wheat grows but also the weeds grow.

‘He makes us realize that he came precisely to help us in our weakness, and that he did not come, as he says, ‘to call the just,’ those who claim they are righteous through and through and are not in need of grace, those who pray praising themselves; but he came to call those who know they are lacking, to provoke those who know they need the Lord's forgiveness every day, that they need his grace to progress.”

Our Lord gives us all the graces to know and accept ourselves, and to open up to God and to others.

Blessed Álvaro del Portillo liked to point out that linked to sincerity is the need to be docile. He said, “There are people who are sincere, and when talking may get down to the bare bones and even exaggerate their defects and difficulties, but they don't listen.”

He highlights the great value of knowing how to listen. In spiritual direction sometimes, we might just be told a word or a phrase. Or we might go to a retreat or to a Circle or to a class or to Confession, and we might hear some little things. But always, the Holy Spirit is speaking to us.

Or it may be that God gives us grace after several days or weeks or months or years to see with greater clarity that thing that has been said to us. The importance of listening, of catching the message. “I would remind you,” he said, “that if anyone wavers, it's because they do not listen.”

Lord, help me to listen well to what you're saying to me when you speak to me through people, through places, through events, in the course of my life, perhaps communicating very important messages.

As we see in the Gospel, they are letting themselves be dominated by the devil—a devil that is not only dumb but also deaf.

We could go through life not listening. When we look at the figure of Judas—that amazing personality that God has placed there, right bang smack in the middle of the apostles, full of so many messages for us, like a warning—he didn't listen.

He heard all the truth, the beautiful words falling from the lips of Jesus, wonderful messages, and lessons. He saw all the miracles.

But nothing penetrated because he didn't listen. A great danger is tied up to not listening, to not getting the message, not realizing what is important and what is not important.

We are told in Friends of God, “It is not necessarily bad will that prevents us from being utterly sincere. Sometimes we may simply have an erroneous conscience. Some people have so formed, or rather deformed, their consciences that they think their dumbness, their lack of simplicity, is something good. They think it is good to say nothing.

“This can even happen to people who have received an excellent training and know the things of God. This may indeed be what is convincing them that they should not speak out. But they are wrong. Sincerity is a must, always. There are no valid excuses, no matter how good they seem” (J. Escrivá, Friends of God, Point 189).

St. Paul talks about practicing charity in the truth (Eph 4:15). “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of my Father in heaven” (Matt. 7:21).

That virtue of sincerity will lead us to simplicity: transparent, clear. “Be wise as serpents and innocent as doves” (Matt. 10:16). We see the joy of Our Lord at the simplicity of Nathanael and His displeasure with the pharisaical attitude.

We are all potential Pharisees. They are also there as a message for us: Be careful. Practice the virtues.

Be simple. Be transparent. Don't be complex. No double life. Be fully in what we are doing. Live in the eternal presence of God. Be like children with their simplicity before their Father God.

One great thing that our formation does, one grace over time, is to de-complicate us. All the things we think are big problems on the inside—when we get them out into the objectivity of another's judgment—often they may seem very small.

We know from experience then that practicing the virtue of sincerity fills us with great peace. All the anxieties or worries or concerns that we may have on the inside, when we talk about them, suddenly lose all their weight. We are helped to see the world in its clear state.

That helps us to be very natural, to be a Christian through and through, to only have fear for sin, and not what people may think or say. Naturalness is not the same as just following the current trend. We are doing things for God.

In the Furrow, we are told, “Anyone who hides a temptation from their spiritual director shares a secret with the devil. They become a friend of the enemy” (J. Escrivá, Furrow, Point 323).

It's a rather interesting statement. It doesn't say: the day that you embezzle $50,000 and don't tell anybody about it, is the day you've made a secret with the devil.

“Anyone who hides a temptation...” The thoughts. Our Lord says to us, ‘What are you thinking about? What are the thoughts that pass through your mind? What sort of temptations do you have?’ so that we get out those things, so that the battle is far away from the walls of the fortress, all the time very aware of the devil who is like a lion ready to pounce.

“He does not stand in the truth because there is no truth in him...he is the father of lies” (John 8:44). Satan's power is in the lie.

He has no power over us except what we give him when we believe his lies. We break his power when we expose his lie—hatred for lies, for deliberate venial sin.

Because his primary weapon is the lie, our greatest defense against him is the truth. Dealing with Satan is not a power encounter; it's a truth encounter.

When we expose his lie with God's truth, his power is broken. “You shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free” (John 8:32).

Plato said, “We can easily forgive a child who is afraid of the dark. The real tragedy of life is when men are afraid of the light.” The light that comes with the Holy Spirit. Lord, give us a great light.

Today, we can ask the Queen of the Apostles to shape us in that great love for the truth, so that we can reflect the truth in everything we say and everything we do, and that love for the truth may make us more apostolically effective.

Queen of Apostles, pray for us.

I thank you, my God, for the good resolutions, affections, and inspirations that you have communicated to me during this meditation. I ask your help to put them into practice. My Immaculate Mother, Saint Joseph, my father and lord, my guardian angel, intercede for me.

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

RK