The real virus is that of sin – Roman correspondence

If men, in this period of pandemic, had been concerned about their spiritual health as much as they were about their physical health, we would all be saints already. Just as there is the Covid virus which, in some cases, is lethal, so there is the virus of sin which, in its most serious variant, leads to certain death of the soul. In the first case, we have done everything to avoid contagion: social distancing, masks, curfews, lockdowns, vaccines, therapies, hand hygiene, temperature detection, billionaire investments by governments and much more. In the second case, most people often do not care not to contract the virus of sin, indeed most of the time they voluntarily seek contagion. Yet, unlike the Coronavirus, we would have very effective tools for both treatment and prevention. Antiviral therapies can find a counterpart in the sacrament of baptism and confession that cancel the virus of sin: the first in the original form, the second in its variants, even the less threatening ones called venial sins. Vaccines have their counterparts in the sacraments – Eucharist and confession again – in prayer and fasting: tools that help in immunity to evil and in preventing others from becoming infected. Just as for more than a year we have been continuously informing ourselves about everything related to the virus, so we should do for the health of our soul: reading the Bible, studying the doctrine, etc. As with the coronavirus we hang from the lips of the experts, so we should hang from the lips of the experts of salvation, that is, the Fathers and Doctors of the Church and the Magisterium of all time. Just as we look with deep interest at the virtuous examples of those countries that are better off than us in the fight against the virus, so we should learn from the saints to understand how to fight against sin. As at the first sign of discomfort we take the thermometer, call the doctor and perform a swab, so at the first suspicion of having sinned we should do a serious examination of conscience and call a priest if the symptoms are severe.

The real virus is that of sin – Roman correspondence