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Real Answers™
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Copyright: © 2008 Donald E. Lindman
590 words
STRANGE OCCURENCES AND THE SINS IN OUR LIVES
By: Don Lindman
I was leaving a nursing home recently when two gentlemen passed me on their way in. They told the receptionist they were priests on their way to hear confessions.
Interesting, I thought. What is going on in that place? What vile acts are those mostly bedridden patients doing that require confession? In fact, what acts of any kind might they be committing that would require this service?
I was quite certain the priests weren’t there for the benefit of the employees, who were too busy caring for patients to be able to deal with their sins right then, right there.
Later I remembered that a convent is attached to the nursing home. Maybe that’s why those gentlemen were there. But what are elderly nuns doing that require the confessional services of two priests? Wouldn’t one be enough?
I’m sure there is a perfectly logical explanation for this, but that explanation wasn’t as obviously present as were the priests.
The bank where I do business has drive-up ATMs with a sign on them saying: “Audio assistance is available for the visually impaired.” I’ve heard of Braille buttons on drive-up ATMs, but I always suspected that was just a good story, a humorous urban legend.
This one is real, because I saw it myself. And the machine also has Braille buttons!
What is audio-assistance for the visually impaired doing at a drive-up ATM? And what are Braille buttons doing on the driver’s side of the car? Something seems wrong here.
I’m sure there is a perfectly logical explanation for this, but it isn’t as obviously present as that sign and the bumps on the buttons.
If you watch TV news you probably have noticed that almost everyone who dies unexpectedly or who is accused of committing a crime is “a wonderful person, a good neighbor, really nice to the kids, and credit to the community.” Is it really true that it is only the good who die young or are accused of criminal acts?
I doubt it. And I doubt that the accused and the tragically dead are as good as their friends like to think. A friend of mine, who was a deeply spiritual man, divided sins into two categories: blatant (like murder, burglary, assault…the “biggies”) and subtle (the ones we’re inclined to forget we have because “they’re really not that bad”).
He found blatant sins fairly obvious to both identify and feel guilt over, but as an experiment he decided to list his subtle sins as he read about sins in the Bible. He got to 63 and quit in discouragement.
Perhaps that is the answer to the need for hearing confessions in a nursing home and in a convent. There may not be a lot of blatant sins going on, but the subtle sins can be rampant.
“All have sinned and fallen short of God’s standard” says the Scripture. That includes me and my spiritual friend and elderly nuns and patients in a nursing home. Even the things we think are really spiritual and great are like “a pile of dirty rags,” the Bible also says. Oh, and by the way: I almost forgot that those Scripture passages include not just me and my spiritual friend, but you, too.
I still can’t figure out why help for the visually impaired exists on drive-up ATMs, but they at least are a sign that we are conscious of the needs of those who are physically impaired. I remember when that wasn’t true, when we just ignored them. Those were subtle sins, too.
"Real Answers™" furnished courtesy of The Amy Foundation Internet Syndicate. To contact the author or The Amy Foundation, write or E-mail to: P. O. Box 16091, Lansing, MI 48901-6091; amyfoundtn@aol.com
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