Despite Shûsaku Endo's doubts about the true Christianity of the Japanese, as expressed in the admirable "Silence," it also seems to me that the Japanese share a fundamental commonality with Christians in their ease in empathizing with others. Isn't this one of the foundational pillars of Christianity, one of the archetypes of the Discourse on the Mountain, the constant belief that our effort hasn't been significant enough, pronounced enough, for understanding to emerge? I certainly see the weakness in this reasoning: the Japanese tirelessly try to put themselves in the other's cultural shoes; they also desire to be better understood; they don't know guilt, but rather shame… The Christian must empathize with others because they believe the fault lies with them, which doesn't mean they committed the fault, but rather that their lack of attention to others led them to not work hard enough to prevent it.
Sin is not inevitable for the Christian, for he knows that he must always consider it as a possibility. He has known this since Adam. Since the Fall. And that is why the Fall exists, to remind us of our weakness and imperfection and to compel us to consider the possibility of sin. Often, this very simple idea transforms into a trial of guilt. At the beginning of Lent, the idea of penance is omnipresent. Those who accuse us of guilt do not understand the essence of penance, which is precisely to review, to hunt down this weakness that constantly burdens us. Penance is not a via dolorosa . It is our weakness that is our via dolorosa . And we can try to remedy it at any time. There is no guilt that cannot be effectively combated with the help of grace. Hunting down the moments when we had to surrender to our weakness is penance. To strive to see beyond, to elevate ourselves, to strive to overcome our weakness through greater awareness and to empirically ensure that we no longer succumb to it—this is penance in its truest form. The fault lies with me. And often the fault stems from a lack of ambition, a lack of faith that breeds the fear of failure. Christ, from the mountaintop, constantly reminds us that Solitus in Excelsis. The solution lies at the highest level.
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