Working at the Car Wash — Yeah!

by Christian Hbaiter – Seminarian for the Eparchy of St. Maron

This past spring in D.C., the pollen season was very bad. My black Jeep was covered in yellow. I told the other seminarians repeatedly that I needed to get a car wash. My windshield had spots of sap on it and having anything on my windshield irks me! Though I could still see out my windshield, just knowing there was something on it made it very distracting, and I couldn’t ignore that it was there. Every day, I said that I would go get a car wash and weeks went by and I still had not. The funny thing is that on my way back to the seminary every day, I had to pass a carwash. The entrance and exit of the carwash were on the main road. I didn’t even have to go off route or out of my way. It couldn’t have been more convenient! I just needed to allow myself five extra minutes. Yet it took me weeks to do it. When I finally did, my Jeep was black again and my windshield was spotless. I felt this relief knowing that though I had been able to see through the windshield fine even with the spots of sap, that my vehicle was finally clean.

Doesn’t confession work the same way? Knowing that I have sinned, I can still go through my days without concern. But there is something lurking in the back of my mind that still bothers me. Every day, I can say I want to go to confession, but every day I can find an excuse not to. When I finally step into the confessional and walk out having received absolution,

it is as though I have walked myself through the car wash. Everything is erased. Everything is made pure. Everything is forgiven. Everything is made new; I am made new. Often, we wait to go to confession because we feel like we don’t have that many sins to confess yet. We haven’t done anything ‘that bad’ that needs confession. But what we won’t realize is that the longer I wait to take my car to the car wash, the dirtier it becomes. The longer I wait to confess my sins, the more I sin. Sin doesn’t like alone time! It thrives on company. Sin just drags along more sin. Who likes to drive around in a dirty car!?

God gave His only son, Jesus, to conquer death in order to reconcile Himself to the world. Every time we sin, our view of God becomes distorted and this distortion gets larger the more we continue to sin, causing us to miss the authentic view of God. This God loves us unconditionally, regardless of how many times we mess up, regardless of how many times we fall into the temptation of sin, regardless of how many times we need to go to confession, regardless of how many times we have become distracted from visiting the confessional. There are 1,000 steps between us and God. Our loving God is willing to take 999 of those steps. He only asks that we take one. One step to know him. One step to reconcile with him. One step into the confessional.