What is the sin against the Holy Spirit?

Francis Cardinal George, OMI
Archbishop of Chicago

Francis Cardinal George, OMI
Archbishop of Chicago

National Catholic Schools Week (Jan. 25-31) gives all of us who have benefited from Catholic education in parochial and other Catholic schools an opportunity to thank the teachers and administrators and staff of these schools for their dedication to the mission of Catholic education.

For almost a century in this country, Catholic schools were mostly "sisters' schools" with a few brothers and priests also in the teaching corps; but the schools now, largely in the hands of dedicated lay people, continue the mission with the same results: young men and women are given the skills necessary and the faith required for life in this world and the next. They move from grade school to high school. They graduate and most go on to college. Most of all, they go on to live responsibly and with hope no matter where God calls them to spend their years on this earth. There is no other system of education that comes anywhere near matching the accomplishments of Catholic schools. In recent months, the Archdiocesan Pastoral Council has been reflecting on the state of our schools and examining the Archdiocese's education policies.
Catholic parents have the obligation to raise their children in the Catholic faith. Their own salvation is in jeopardy if they fail to help their children accept and live according to God's gift of faith. Catholic schools are not the only means of handing on the faith, but they are among the best means of doing so, along with Catholic family life and the parish. Parents have many reasons to make use of Catholic schools: excellent education; safe and secure environment; assurance that the values in the school are the values of the home. A couple of months ago, I sat next to a woman at a fund-raiser for a Catholic high school in Chicago. She told me her 11-year-old son was in the local parochial school, although the children of many of her friends were in exclusive private schools. When I asked her why she sent him to the parochial school, she responded: "Cardinal, he's 11 years old. When he's 19, I want to be able to sit across the table from him and know who he is."
That's an excellent reason for sending a child to a Catholic school. The basic reason, however, that the Church runs schools at all is to tell everyone who Jesus Christ is. It's acceptable to raise this question; it's resented when it is answered with the certitude of faith. Pontius Pilate long ago asked Jesus himself: "What is truth?" (Jn. 18:38). A man of power, Pilate was cynical about anything beyond questions of clout. More gentle people might simply be skeptical of answers about anything beyond their own experience. Isn't it more important, they ask, to do one's best, to be honest and kind and try to make the world a better place, without getting taken up with abstract questions which only serve to divide people? Why fuss about what we should believe?
It's important to keep asking, "Is this true, and why?" in every area of our experience. A human person who lives in falsehood lives less freely than God has made us to live. Practically, it's important to know if it's truly raining or if the sun is out. It's important for an engineer to know the truth about stress in every different building material. It's important for a wife to know the truth about her husband, if there is to be trust between them. It's supremely important to know if it's true that God so loves the world that he sent his only-begotten Son, born of a woman, to be our savior (Jn. 3: 16 and Gal. 4:4). Methods for coming to the truth in all these matters can and do vary; but whether one lives in truth or in error determines, finally, whether one lives in freedom or delusion, in hope or despair.
Catholic schools share in the Church's mission to tell the truth and to continue in the search to deepen our understanding of it. Our schools are free to discuss questions, especially about God and other truths of faith, that other schools cannot raise. Speaking the truths of faith is not always welcomed, however, and our schools must also train students to be martyrs. Martyrs are believers who are able to bring their faith into every area of experience: business, politics, the arts, health care, farming and manufacturing, sales and communications. Martyrs are prepared, in the presence of skepticism and power, to account for the hope that is in them (I Peter 3:15). They know their faith and can explain it as they live it. They are aware of the action of God in their lives and in the world and they do their best, with God's grace, to respond faithfully, each according to his or her own vocation from God.
What, then, is the sin against the Holy Spirit? To lose hope by deliberately denying the truth, because this sin fixes one's will in evil and makes one a servant of the Father of Lies. Not even God can forgive someone who deliberately chooses to reject him, whose hardness of heart closes the mind (Mt. 12:31; Mk. 3:29; Lk. 12;10). For the mind, there are solid sermons and books, good catechesis and Catholic education; for the heart, there are loving parents, caring pastors and the company of saints. We live in hope because God freely sends the Holy Spirit; but we have the duty to train the young to live in spirit and in truth.
This year's theme for Catholic Schools Week is "Catholic Schools: A Faith-Filled Future." I am most grateful to all who support Catholic education and the Catholic schools.

Sincerely yours in Christ,
Francis Cardinal George, OMI
Archbishop of Chicago

Editor: Tygodnik Katolicki "Niedziela", ul. 3 Maja 12, 42-200 Czestochowa, Polska
Editor-in-chief: Fr Jaroslaw Grabowski • E-mail: redakcja@niedziela.pl