Anna Therese
Active Member
Now I am wondering: Jesus is holy, God is holy, the Holy Spirit is Holy. All three of the Godhead is perfectly sinless and holy. Blasphemy against Jesus is forgivable. Blasphemy against God the Father is forgivable. Blasphemy against the Holy Spirit is unforgivable. Why?
I believe that God could choose to forgive someone who blasphemed the Holy Spirit but He chooses not to. Why? What's so different about the nature of this sin versus other sins?
Cardinal Manning explains it this way: Our Divine Lord has said, "Every sin and every blasphemy shall be forgiven unto men, except the blasphemy of the Holy Ghost; and if any man shall speak a word against the Son of man, it shall be forgiven him; but whosoever speaketh against the Holy Ghost, it shall never be forgiven him in this world nor in the world to come." (Matt. 12:31-32).
A man may speak against Jesus Christ, ay, blaspheme his Lord; and the Holy Spirit, convincing him of sin, may bring him to repentance, may convert him to God, and his soul may be saved; but any man who commits mortal sin and refuses repentance, thereby blasphemes the Holy Ghost, who is the Spirit of Penance, the Spirit of Absolution, the Absolver of the penitent. Such a sinner rejects the whole dispensation of grace; and, therefore, the sin that shall never be forgiven is impenitence. Every sin that men repent of shall be forgiven; but the sin that is not repented of shall never be forgiven, neither in this world nor in the world to come.
The "sin against the Holy Ghost," which "shall never be forgiven," is a sin unto death. This comprises sins that embody a stubborn resistance to the inspirations of the Holy Ghost and His work in the soul, and an open contempt for His gifts. These sins are six: despair of one's salvation, presumption of God's mercy, resisting the known truths of faith, envy of another's spiritual good, obstinacy in sin, and final impenitence. Although no sin is absolutely unpardonable, those who sin against the Holy Ghost stubbornly resist the influence of grace and do not wish to repent. Hence their sin cannot be forgiven them.
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