Necessary Sin?

One of the most confusing, disarming, yet powerful prayers of our Catholic Church is one that we say every year as a part of the Easter Vigil. It goes like this – “Oh happy fault, oh necessary sin of Adam that won for us so great a Redeemer!”

How can this be? How can we call a fault a ‘happy’ thing? How can we call sin ‘necessary’? It seems to make no sense, and yet is something that our Church boldly proclaims, every year, in the midst of the greatest of all celebrations – the Resurrection of Christ!

Before we go any further, I would like to clarify an important point – it is not God’s will that we sin. Sin separates us from God and one another, and is not something that we should pursue; rather, we should seek to avoid sin at all costs. We should strive for lives of holiness, since without holiness (according the New Testament) we ‘cannot see the Lord.’ And, St. Paul tells us clearly that ‘the wages of sin is death’ and according to Jesus ‘anyone who sins becomes a slave of sin’.

That being said, how can we make sense of this reference to a ‘happy fault’ and a ‘necessary sin’? Only, I believe, when we keep in mind that God’s full-time job is turning all things - even those that we consider evil, painful, and confusing - into good. St. Paul says in Romans 8:28 (one of my favorite verses) “We know that all things work for good for those who love God, who are called according to his purpose”. I have seen this happen countless times in my own life, the lives of my friends, and in our world. I sin, and it brings me back to God in repentance. A tragic illness gets people praying, in the hope for healing. A drug addict enters treatment. The devastation of a tsunami or a hurricane brings out the kindness and generosity that had been hidden deep in the hearts of people throughout the world. I could go on and on.

In *Perelandra*, the second book of his fictional space trilogy, author C.S. Lewis sets out a scenario wherein there is a world that sin never entered in to. On this fictional planet, they refer to Earth as the ‘bent planet’ because of our sin and disobedience, and yet there is a sense in which they envy us because they have heard a rumor that God actually came to us in person and walked our planet in the flesh.

So, although sin, death, destruction and tragedy are not good things, in and of themselves – they can result in good and can be turned toward good, especially for those who remain open to God’s grace instead of becoming embittered. As a friend of mine said recently, “God teaches us, in the Resurrection, that death and destruction are not the final word.” God always has more to say. Are we listening? And, are we letting him speak through us?

To me, it is a staggering thought when I consider that had Adam not sinned, had sin not entered the world, and if I you and I were not sinners, there would be no need for Jesus – not for me, nor for anyone else.

So, today I am thanking God for ‘necessary sin’ – not only the sin of Adam, which ‘won for us so great a Redeemer’, but I am also going to thank God for my own personal sin – because sick people need a doctor, and I am infected. I need the healing mercy of Christ; and that is a good thing – in fact, it is the best thing I have ever experienced in my life!