Do you see how dangerous it is to keep silent? He dies, and rightly dies; he dies in his own wickedness and sin; his own heedlessness kills him. Yes, the one who says I live, says the Lord, would like to find a living shepherd. But since he has been heedless, not being warned by the one who was given charge and made a watchman for this very purpose of warning him, he will die justly, and the other will be justly condemned. . . . It is our business not to keep quiet; it is your business, even if we do keep quiet, to listen to the words of the shepherd from the holy Scriptures.

Mine is the burden that you just heard about when the prophet Ezekiel was read. It is not enough that the day itself admonishes us to reflect on the burden; in addition such a lesson was read to excite great fear in us, so we will think about what we are carrying. Unless the One who imposed the burden on us carried it with us, we fail.

How are we affected by Ezekiel, the beholder and expositor of the mighty mysteries and visions? By his injunction to the watchmen not to keep silence concerning vice and the sword impending over it, a course that would profit neither themselves nor the sinners, but rather to keep watch and forewarn and thus benefit at any rate those who gave warning, if not both those who spoke and those who heard.

These words teach that it is God who gives peace to people because of goodness and allows wars to happen because of the wickedness of people who bring disaster on themselves.

So it is necessary for you, the shepherd of Christ’s sheep, to acquire, as we have said, every virtue of body and spirit. You are the head of the body of the church of Israel that is under your rule, so that the brothers may look to you as a good pattern and imprint on themselves those excellent and royal traits of character. May your trumpet never cease to resound! It should warn some of the sword that comes on the disobedient and stubborn, so that even if they ignore you, you may save your soul from the terrible wrath of God.

For this reason, overseers or rulers are set over the churches to reprimand sin, not to spare it. Nor is a person fully free from blame who is not in authority but who notices in those persons he meets in social life many faults he should censure and admonish. He is blameworthy if he fails to do this out of fear of hurting feelings or of losing such things as he may rightfully enjoy in his life but to which he is unduly attached.

The watchman of the house of Israel can be understood as king or a prophet; the watchman of the church can be understood as to be the bishop or the presbyter who has been chosen by the people, in the reading of the Scriptures, recognizing and foreseeing what the future will hold, proclaiming to the people and correcting what is wrong.

In all this he thought of himself as a watchman set by the Lord over the house of Israel; he preached the word in season and out of season, convincing, exhorting, rebuking and teaching with unfailing patience^[1] and taking special care to teach in turn those fitted for teaching others.^[2] When asked by some to take a hand in their temporal concerns, he wrote letters to various persons for them, but he regarded this occupation as a kind of forced labor that took him away from more important things. His real delight was to speak of the things of God, whether in public addresses or at home in familiar converse with his brothers.

Although it is best for us to be ever aware of our unworthiness and to confess our sins before God, nevertheless it is good and necessary to speak when the times demand it, for I see the church that God founded on the apostles and prophets, its cornerstone being Christ his Son, tossed on an angry sea, beaten by rushing waves, shaken and troubled by the assaults of evil spirits. Impious people seek to rend asunder the seamless robe of Christ and to cut his body in pieces: his body, which is the Word of God and the ancient tradition of the church. Therefore I think it unreasonable to keep silence and hold my tongue.

You though, standing there, having made no decision to put yourself right—let me speak like this as though to a single person. Whoever you are, you do not want to put yourself right; what are you promising yourself?

We must prepare our hearts and bodies for the battle of holy obedience to his instructions. What is not possible to us by nature, let us ask the Lord to supply by the help of his grace. RULE OF ST.

Let your charity believe devoutly and firmly that God never abandons a person unless he is first deserted by him. Although a person may have committed serious sins once, twice and a third time, God still looks for him.

How can we imagine without grievous blasphemy that he does not generally will all men, but only some instead of all to be saved?

How then is he good and merciful and full of loving kindness to humankind? Even here he is merciful, and he shows in these things the greatness of his lovingkindness. For he shows us these terrors, that through being constrained by them we may be awakened to the desire of the kingdom.

He who has thus satisfied God, who by repentance for his deed, who by shame for his sin has conceived more of both virtue and faith from the very sorrow for his lapsing, after being heard and aided by the Lord, will cause the church to rejoice, which he recently had saddened, and will merit not only the pardon of God but a crown.

At whatever age a person will do true penance for his sins and change his life for the better under the illumination of God, he will not be deprived of the gift of forgiveness.

Nothing makes God so angry as when people from despair of better things cleave to those which are worse; and indeed this despair in itself is a sign of unbelief. One who despairs of salvation can have no expectation of a judgment to come.

Now this is what he actually is saying: you have entertained sin, I have pardoned you; you have done evil, I have forgiven you; you have not repented of your sins, I have excused you: did you also have to teach evil? What the Scripture implies is this: For three sins and for four, I shall not be angered against you, says the Lord.

For the wickedness of the wicked shall not hurt him in the day that he turns from his wickedness. If he acts righteously and walks in the statutes of life, he shall surely live; he shall not die. None of his sins that he committed shall be remembered against him. Because he has made the decree of righteousness, he shall live by it.

As a result, dearly beloved, it was necessary (by the designs of a secret plan) for the unchangeable God (whose will cannot be separated from his goodness) to complete by a deeper mystery the first intentions of his love. It was necessary that human beings, tricked into sin by the devil’s wickedness, should not perish in opposition to God’s plan.

For this reason the Lord descended so that he might save sinners, raise up the dead and bring new life to those wounded by death and to enlighten those who lay in darkness. The Lord truly came and called us to be God’s adopted children, to enter into a holy city, ever at peace, to possess a life that will endure forever, to share an incorruptible glory. Let us each strive to come to a good end after a good beginning. Let us persevere in poverty, in our pilgrimage, living in affliction and petitions to God without any shame as we continuously knock at the door.

You, I say, who are timid after being shameless, who are bashful after sinning! You who are not ashamed to sin but are ashamed to confess! You who with an evil conscience touch the holy things of God and do not fear the altar of the Lord! You who approach the hands of the priest and who come within the sight of the angels with the boldness of innocence! You who insult the divine patience! You who bring to God a polluted soul and a profane body, as if, because God is silent, he does not know! Hear what the Lord has done and then what he has said.

Now therefore, Christians, since we know from the holy Scriptures and from divine revelations how great is the grace that God dispenses to those who truly run to him for refuge and who blot out their sins through repentance, and also how, according to his promise, he rewards them with good things and neither takes vengeance according to what is just nor bring on people a punishment for their sins, let us not be in despair of our lives.

Come now, you tightrope walker, walking on a tightrope of purity and chastity and every sort of sexual asceticism, you who, on the slender cord of a discipline like this, far from the path of truth, advance with reluctant feet, balancing the flesh by the spirit, moderating your desires by the faith, guarding your eyes through fear, why do you watch your step so anxiously?

Having considered God’s generosity, we pray next for his indulgence. For of what benefit is food if, in reality, we are bent on it like a bull on his victim? Our Lord knew that he alone was without sin.^[1] Therefore he taught us to say in prayer, Forgive us our trespasses. A prayer for pardon is an acknowledgment of sin, since one who asks for pardon confesses guilt. Thus, too, repentance is shown to be acceptable to God, because God wills this rather than the death of the sinner.

He wished that Adam’s transgression had not occurred. And because God knew beforehand the transgression, he commanded him beforehand not to eat of the fruit of the tree. And because he did not submit to the order, justly he was punished.

We must press on and persevere in the faith and virtue and in the consummation of heavenly and spiritual grace, that we may be able to arrive at the palm and the crown.

When God offers us conversion on whatever day one may be willing to practice it, why do they not instead crown with grateful praises him who aids them, instead of foolishly and (we might say) contumaciously opposing him? For by so doing they bring condemnation on their own heads and call down on themselves inevitable wrath.

In the lives of Christians we look not to the beginnings but to the endings. Paul began badly but ended well. The start of Judas wins praise; his end is condemned because of his treachery.

If you are righteous, fear his wrath lest you slip; if you are a sinner, believe in his mercy so that you can arise. But see, we have already fallen, we are not strong enough to stand, we lie prostrate in our evil desires. He who created us to be upright still waits, and he appeals to us to rise. He opens up his heart of love and seeks to get us back to himself again through repentance.

We are taught that we ought not obstinately stick to our determination, but that we should with gentle pity soften down the threats which derived from some necessity.

Remember God, that He too might always remember you; and when He has kept you in His memory and preserved you safe to the end, you will receive every blessing from Him. Do not forget Him, your mind being distracted with futile concerns, lest He forget you in the time of your warfare. When you enjoy abundance, be obedient to Him, so that in the time of your afflictions you may have boldness before Him through the heart’s persevering prayer to Him.

All this shows that the sinner must not despair of salvation if he does penance, nor should the righteous person trust in his own righteousness if he lost through his own carelessness what he had laboriously sought.

The mouth of the prophet is opened when he is shown that what he had foretold has in fact happened, and he proclaims it with complete freedom.

Jerusalem is captured and the temple is destroyed, and the poor earth of which Jeremiah wrote was left behind in Jerusalem. Those who kept vines and tilled the land live in the ruins of burned city; when they ought to repent of the things that had brought about their captivity, they blind themselves with a false hope by saying, Abraham was only one man, yet he got possession of the land.

Every heretic lives in ruins and in the desert and thinks that he possesses the land of Israel.