Practical Devotion of the Day: Doing Penance for Our Sins

1. What penance do we do. Sins are continuous in us, they multiply without measure. From early childhood to the present age, we would try in vain to enumerate them; like a huge burden, they crush our shoulders! Faith tells us that God demands a suitable satisfaction from every sin, threatens tremendous punishments in Purgatory for the least venial sins; and what penance do I do? Why am I running away from it so much?

2. Do not delay penance. You wait to do penance when the youthful fury has subsided, the whims diminished; ... but if you run out of time, you can get yourself Hell or centuries of Purgatory. You wait for old age, but in such a short time, how to pay for so many years? You are waiting for the season of melancholy, of infirmities; then you will necessarily adapt ... But of what value will a forced penance be, between impatience, lamentations and new sins? Who has time, don't wait for time. Trust the uncertain, those who trust the future.

3. Do not trust for the penance done. For a single thought of pride, God condemned the Angels to eternal flames; Adam for nine centuries did penance of a single disobedience; only one grave fault is punished with Hell, a place of unspeakable torments; and you for a slight penance after Confession, or for some very small mortifications made, do you think you have paid everything? The Saints always feared on this point, and you don't fear? Maybe you will have to cry one day ...

PRACTICE. - Do some penance for your sins; recites the seven joys of the Madonna.