“Christians and Excuses”

In the seventh century, St. Gregory the Great preached a sermon on the matter of Christians excusing themselves from their spiritual commitments. It seems that many of the Christians in Rome were becoming lazy in their spiritual discipline and were absenting themselves, without good reason, from their spiritual responsibilities. St. Gregory pointed out the inconsistency of human behavior, in that Christians are eager to meet secular responsibilities, yet become reluctant to meet the expectations of Christ upon their lives, and become proficient at excusing themselves from meeting those responsibilities.

This sin, of course, is not unique to the seventh century. Even in the twentieth century, St. Gregory’s sermon speaks of a dilemma which we all face, and few of us today could read this sermon without being convicted by its power and relevance.

The Christian life, if followed seriously, can be demanding, and consistent application to prayer, Christian community, study of the Scriptures and the pursuit of holiness are expectations which are made of every Christian. Indeed, when we are baptized, we vow to follow Christ for the remainder of our lives and into eternity. This means that we must apply ourselves to the demands of the spiritual life if we are to fulfill those vows, and when we fail, we should repent and begin again.

However, sinful human nature being what it is, we Christians tend to think that we can opt out of our responsibilities and do so without consequence. Hence, we engage in the age old practice of excuse making in regard to our spiritual commitments, and the following are some of those excuses.

“I’ll do it when,” is one of the most common of excuses. This line or reasoning puts off the immediacy of Christian responsibility in order to accomplish some other task. By implication, this excuse suggests that our spiritual responsibility is not as important as other events in our lives. Usually, when we utter these words, we place our commitment aside and never accomplish it. When “when” is a key word, we will never do it.

A second excuse, related to the first is “I’ve got too many things to do.” This excuse immediately suggests that our priorities are out of order. Our hierarchy of responsibilities ought to be God, spouse, family, and job, in that order. When we keep our commitments in proper order, the very nature of Christian stewardship and responsibility will ensure that there is time for each. When we get out of order, we will often find our involvement determined by what interests us most at the time. We are apt not to fulfill many of our spiritual commitments and we are saying, by implication, that God is not a priority in our lives. There is an old saying which claims that “either He is Lord of all or He’s not Lord at all.”

A third and common excuse is “I just don’t get anything out of it.” Key words in this excuse are “I” and “get anything.” This usually suggests spirituality which is self-centered rather than God-centered and which is based upon feelings rather than commitment. It is important to remember that we have asked Christ to be Lord of our lives; this means following Him faithfully, particularly at times when we may not feel like it or when we may think we are getting nothing out of it. If our response to God is based upon our feelings, the devil will make sure that we don’t feel like it most of the time.

Some excuse themselves by claiming that their contributions are not important. St. Paul refutes this notion by stating that “the parts of the body [the Church] which seem to be weaker are indispensable.” [1 Cor. 12:22] Every contribution to the Christian community is invaluable, but if we excuse ourselves, on the premise that our contribution is insignificant, we end up making no contribution at all.

Another common excuse is the one which places blame on someone. “They’re all hypocrites,” “they’re not truly spiritual,” “someone offended me,” “I had a bad experience in a church once,” or “they’re always asking for money.” In this line of reasoning the sin of another , another’s failure to maintain responsibility, is used to excuse us from our own responsibility. There is a certain irony in this rationale.

A final excuse is the most honest. “I don’t want to” makes the most sense, because it is a summary of all the other excuses, and the one who utters these words is, at least, not deluding himself.

Having said all of this, it is important to point out how inconsistent excuse making really is. In the secular realm, that is, in our jobs and family and social commitments, we constantly and repeatedly meet expectations even though we don’t want to or though the other parties don’t meet our expectations. We do it because it is expected of us, because it will make others happy, because it is the right thing to do, or simply because we gave our word [a thing called “vows”].

These same principles apply to the spiritual life. If we constantly excuse ourselves from our Christian responsibility we will never know the blessings that can be had from doing our duty and living up to [or at least trying] what Christ expects of us. On the other hand, if we can obediently approach our Christian commitments because it is expected of us, because it will please God, family and others, because it is the right thing to do, or simply because we vowed this at our baptisms, we will find the spiritual life taking on new and deeper meaning. Spiritual fulfillment won’t be attained by excuses; it can only be accomplished by faithful application.