Catholics have long understood the importance of examining their conscience. For most Catholics this practice is a ritual before entering the confessional.
For some, more devout Catholics, however, an examination of conscience is a daily discipline. It helps one recognize sin, acknowledge fault, and seek reconciliation with God. And truly, without honest self‑reflection, one can drift into spiritual blindness, unable to distinguish virtue from vice.
Affirmation in Today’s World
Today’s modern, secular, post-Christian thinking, however, seems wholly unable to distinguish virtue from vice. More and more society affirms and celebrates sin as something normal and even good.
Instead of encouraging people to strive for virtue, excellence, and holiness, society often insists that individuals are “perfect just as they are.” This message may sound compassionate, but it denies the reality of human imperfection with the need for growth.
This attitude also contradicts Scripture, which calls believers to continual conversion: “Do not conform yourselves to this age but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and pleasing and perfect” (Romans 12:2).
One example is the modern insistence that a one‑parent home is “just as good” as a stable home with a mother and father. While single parents often heroically carry burdens they never sought, the ideal remains unchanged.
Decades of sociological data affirm that children raised in two‑parent households fare better in education, emotional stability, and long‑term societal contribution. The Brookings Institution, for instance, has repeatedly shown that children in stable two‑parent homes are significantly more likely to graduate high school, avoid poverty, and maintain stable employment. The Institute for Family Studies likewise reports that children raised by married biological parents experience markedly lower rates of behavioral problems and higher rates of academic achievement.
Nevertheless, secular society insists on affirming every arrangement as equally ideal. This includes single parenthood, cohabitation, and homosexual parenthood. The affirmation is insincere because it refuses to acknowledge that an ideal exists at all. Over and above this it is just plain incorrect.
This ideology willfully denies children benefit from the complementarity temperaments of a mother and a father. It denies that the family structure designed by God is normative. Moreover, it denies that striving for the ideal is both possible and necessary.
Affirmation becomes a substitute for truth like a salve that numbs the conscience rather than heals the soul. Affirmation is becoming a cultural habit that refuses to recognize sin, disorder, or brokenness making it the true opposite of repentance.
Affirming and Excusing Sin
Today’s society not only tolerates sin it affirms sin. It now celebrates behaviors once recognized as harmful. Today these behaviors are expressions of authenticity, liberation, and identity. The cultural shift is not subtle; it is deliberate.
Homosexual marriage is one example. The Church teaches clearly that marriage is a sacrament between one man and one woman, ordered toward procreation and edification of children.
Post Modernists not only reject this teaching but celebrate its rejection. Modern society affirms a union that contradicts natural law and divine revelation demanding applause for what scripture identifies as sin (Romans 1:26‑27).
Open marriages follow the same pattern – the culture now permits infidelity. It’s even marketed as enlightened, liberating, progressive, and emotionally mature. The violation of marital vows becomes a lifestyle brand. The destruction of trust becomes a virtue.
Cosplay (i.e., costume play) may be fun at a Start Trek or comic book convention. However, it has become very common for biological women to claim to be male and vice a versa. Modern culture affirms this rejection of both biology and the identity established at conception. It celebrates delusion as courage and disorder as authenticity while demanding that others affirm the illusion, even when the truth is evident. This is not compassion; this is bearing false witness.
Many in society even celebrate violent sins. Not too long ago social media erupted with comments praising a shooter who gunned down a healthcare CEO. Commenters called the murder justified and even heroic. The sin was not merely excused; it was applauded.
The execution of unborn children through abortion follows the same logic. The crime of inconvenience becomes grounds for death. Society affirms abortion as healthcare, empowerment, and liberation.
The Lindsay Clancy trial revealed another dimension of affirmation: affirming excuses. Clancy, a Massachusetts mother, strangled her three children. The crime was horrific, heartbreaking, and morally indefensible.
Many women, however, publicly supported Clancy, claiming they “felt the same way” at times – overwhelmed, exhausted, or mentally strained. But none of these reasons justify murder.
This thinking is psychotic. Millions of parents (both mothers and fathers) experience exhaustion, anxiety, and stress without harming their children. To affirm Clancy’s actions because one has felt overwhelmed is to affirm an excuse rather than confront the sin.
The logic becomes chilling. If a woman supports Clancy because she “understands,” what does that imply about her own capacity for violence? If one is the husband of such a woman, does one feel safe leaving the children home alone with her? If one’s mother expresses sympathy for Clancy, would one allow her to watch her grandchildren?
Affirmation and excuses erode moral clarity. It blurs the line between suffering and sin. As my wife puts it, it transforms empathy into something toxic.
All of these examples reveal how deeply affirmation culture has infected the conscience of modern society.
Truth as the Antidote
Personally, I do believe people in society are knowingly lying to themselves. The tell is the demand for affirmation. People know their choices are sinful so they require affirmation.
Truth is the antidote to affirmation culture. Truth recognizes sin for what it is.
Christ Himself declared, “you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free” (John 8:32). Truth calls the sinner to repentance. Truth refuses to celebrate what destroys the soul.
To summarize, St. Thomas Aquinas taught that truth is the conformity of the mind to reality (Summa Theologiae, I, Q16). When culture affirms sin, society demands that the mind conform to deceptions. Aquinas also taught that vice is a turning away from God and a disordering of reason (Summa Theologiae, II, Q71). Affirmation encourages this disorder. Repentance, by contrast, restores order and is a path to holiness.
The world may affirm sin, but Christ never will. He calls every soul not to self‑celebration, but to conversion, repentance, and freedom from sin. That call is the greatest mercy of all.
TY TY for excellent article. At the end of the day there is one affirmation that counts: Yes, I know you, come on in (Jesus). Guy, Texas