Whatever Happened To Penance And Mortification?

Whatever Happened To Penance And Mortification?

Could we imagine what it would be like if athletes stopped training their bodies? It would be unthinkable. Without training they would never have the strength and stamina required to perform. They also would lose their fans, since we respect athletes because of the great feats their training allows them to perform.

The same can be said of the saints, the champion athletes of the Faith. They are exemplars not of physical training but of the ascetic life. This ancient staple of our Faith is viewed today by many as obsolete, superseded by our modern advances in… well that’s just the problem.

Nothing has filled the void of mortifications. For no reason other than an apparent ignorance and muted practice, we don’t think much of penances unless it is those assigned to us after a confession, or a small pleasure we give up for Lent. We may be wearing the full armor of God, but it’s paper thin. We’re wielding spiritual swords, but against demonic temptations we’re not even able to slice a stick of butter.

Nothing has filled the void of mortifications because there is nothing that can. Mortifications and penances are the spiritual training that make us winners of the race, and winners of the good fight (2 Tim. 4:7).

In Scripture there are numerous references to mortification of the flesh but none is more clear (and more appropriate to compare to athletes) than Paul’s exhortation to the Corinthians:

“Do you not know that in a race all the runners compete, but only one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain it. Every athlete exercises self-control in all things. They do it to receive a perishable wreath, but we are imperishable. Well, I do not run aimlessly, I do not box as one beating the air; but I pommel my body and subdue it, lest after preaching to others I myself should be disqualified” (1 Cor. 9:24-27).

Paul is not sugarcoating his words here. To pommel literally means to strike and beat. There are amazing stories about the ways in which saints tamed their flesh. Saint Benedict is said to have jumped into a thorn bush to quit thinking lustfully. Philip Neri wore hot, itchy shirts made of horse hair. Saint Gemma wore a thin belt of knots tightly under her clothes. And there’s less severe mortifications performed by the saints, like when St. John Paul II slept on the floor. Mortifications are absolutely saintly because self-mastery is a requirement of every Christian.

Saint Aloysius Gonzaga, stands among the greatest of the self-mortifiers.

The first reason he is an exemplar of mortification is his rigor, which is unmatched, and the second is his youth. “I am but a crooked piece of iron,” he is popularly remembered as saying, “and have come into religion to be made straight by the hammer of mortification and penance.”

We’re going to draw a few lessons from him in order to encourage this holy obligation, and of strict importance, to do it the right way.

Aloysius correctly understood that mortifications were directed to self-denial and thus self-mastery. Another saying attributed to him that has come down to us is, “There is no more evident sign that anyone is a saint and of the number of the elect, than to see him leading a good life and at the same time a prey to desolation, suffering, and trials.”

But there seems to be no reason of the flesh that Gonzaga would need to mortify his flesh. He is regarded as one of the most sinless saints ever, which is why fellow Counter-Reformer St. Charles Borromeo rejoiced when he was privileged to serve Gonzaga his First Communion.

He has been compared by saints of his generation and in later ones the best imitator of the child Jesus. Any further efforts at purity might seem to us like embellishment. Nonetheless the wisdom of our young saint was so far beyond his years, and along with this he also had a teeming desire to suffer like the saints and martyrs he read so often about.

But he was royalty and he was not going off to the dangerous adventures of a missionary any time soon. So as means of participating like Peter and Paul in the sufferings of Christ (cf. Phil. 3:10; 1 Pet. 4:13), he continued this practice to share in this mystery.

What mortifications and penances did Aloysius perform, and what is necessary of us?

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