Saturday: 3rd week of Ordinary Time

In today’s first reading from 2 Samuel, we hear of Nathan’s exposing David’s heinous crimes, and his repentence.

Jewish and Christian traditions believe that King David wrote many of the 150 psalms that make up the “prayer book of the Church.” As a young man in the army camp, 1 Samuel tells us, he sometimes sang and played a stringed instrument to soothe the troubled mind of his mentor-king, Saul. Many years later he would pick up the harp again to express remorse for his own sinful behavior. Psalm 51 is that song.

Repentance may be the most important gift King David gave to us. I spoke once to a RCIA group about penance, the virtue and the sacrament. The new candidates listened respectfully, but the lifelong Catholics wondered what on earth was I talking about. “Penance is three Our Fathers and three Hail Marys!” How do you respond to that?

Penance is first of all a virtue; secondly it is a sacrament. The simplest way I know to explain it is, “I am not God, thank God!” When Nathan confronted him David realized he had committed a most grievous sin. He had committed adultery with Bathsheba and murdered her husband, Uriah. He had forgotten his love, gratitude and obedience to God. He had played God.

It was all too easy for a warrior who had killed men, who had led men into battle and overseen the slaughter of thousands, who had devised winning feints that saved his army and his cause while sacrificing some fine young men, to have a simpleton like Uriah killed. No one but warriors like himself would suspect what he had done. No one but God knew, and God spoke to Nathan.

David’s great contribution to our faith is the virtue of penance. Of the three most importat persons of the Old Testament -- Abraham, Moses and David -- David is the first to recognize his own sins which were not the sins of the nation. He expresses the Virtue of Penance best in Psalm 51, but it is manifest also in Psalms 7, 32, 38, 102, 130, and 143. These are the traditional Seven Penitential Psalms. Their focus is on the personal sins of an individual. I would add Psalm 106, which recalls the sins of the nation. Since the Vatican Council the Church has become more aware of the systemic sins that we tolerate and support within our families, businesses, church, governments and society. 

In our Catholic tradition, the Sacrament of Penance explicitly celebrates the virtue of penance, but every sacrament forgives sin and every honest prayer is a turning away from sin. We must practice the virtue every day and many times a day, if we would be disciples of Jesus, the Son of David.