How Can the Blood of Christ Wash Away My Guilt?
I was praying St. Bridget’s prayer for the souls in purgatory when some lines caught my attention:
May the Blood of Christ,
The last precious content
Of His Holy Heart,
Wash us and others
Of all the guilt of our sins.
This is not the first time I heard about it. As a Christian, I knew that Christ’s blood washes away our sins. After all, did He not pay for our salvation with His death on the cross?
But looking at it from another angle, I now ask, “How could His death take away our guilt?”
Indeed, how could hurting Jesus to the point of death because of my sins wash me from my guilt? Shouldn’t it be all the more reason to feel guilty?
Guilt is that feeling of having hurt someone, of being the cause of someone else’s pain. Doesn’t Christ’s blood remind me all the more of my transgressions?
I tried to reflect upon this more deeply. This time, instead of using the formula for justice (Christ paying for my sins), I tried to see things from the perspective of love and compassion.
Christ’s death shows me above all His incomparable love for me. That’s what His death on the cross means.
“For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him might not perish but might have eternal life.” - John 3:16 (NAB)
It all began from love and happened because of God’s love for me.
Instead of looking at my misery, I should look instead at God’s love.
God loves me so much that He suffered even the pains of the cross for me. He loves me so much that He doesn’t want me to continue looking at myself with self-pity or shame.
When I look at God, I should not see a stern judge condemning me. I should see a Savior and Friend who cares for me. Someone who knows me and understands where I’m coming from.
He knows my weaknesses. He sees the consequences of original sin on my spiritual and physical body.
More than anyone, Jesus sees how much I struggled to do what is right only to fail again and again.
Jesus knows I never wanted to hurt Him but I keep on doing so. I wanted to love Him, but I failed to love Him enough.
“For I do not do the good I want, but I do the evil I do not want. Now if [I] do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me. So, then, I discover the principle that when I want to do right, evil is at hand. For I take delight in the law of God, in my inner self, l but I see in my members another principle at war with the law of my mind, taking me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members. Miserable one that I am! Who will deliver me from this mortal body? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord. Therefore, I myself, with my mind, serve the law of God but, with my flesh, the law of sin.” - Romans 7:19-25 (NAB)
And what must a loving God do to such a child? He shows her His sacred heart. A heart that bleeds with love, understanding and mercy.
“Here is my infinite mercy and compassion. Take it! Wash away all of your guilt with my blood, the last precious content of my sacred heart.”
And that’s what the lines of St. Bridget’s prayer mean.
In Jesus’ own words to St. Faustina: “Here, soul, are all the treasures of My Heart. Take everything you need from it.”
Salvation comes in believing Jesus Christ’s love for me and allowing my whole self to be immersed in that love. It comes from allowing His mercy to sweep away all of my guilt and shame.
Christ doesn’t want me to forever feel separated from Him. He wants me to accept His forgiveness, understanding and compassion.
Praise be the Lord’s infinite love and compassion that washes away all of our guilt and makes us worthy to be with Him for all eternity!
“Hence, now there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus... For you did not receive a spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you received a spirit of adoption, through which we cry, ‘Abba, Father!’” - Romans 8:1,15 (NAB)
Is the burden you’re carrying too heavy to bear? Seek refuge in Christ’s Compassion.
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