Recently I heard someone declare that he believed in God's unconditional love for him and that God loved him just as he was. I have no quibble with the unconditional love bit. God does love unconditionally. His love for us is not dependent on our behaviour, individually or collectively, but is a free, unmerited and unasked for, unimaginable gift. But to say that God loves unconditionally is not the same as saying that God loves indifferently. To say that God's love is not lessened by sin is not the same as saying that God does not care about sin. God loves me not as I am but as He intends me to be i.e. in perfect union with Him. He loves that I exist and all that is good in me but not the evil, not the sin. God hates sin. God hates sin because it makes me less than human. Sin damages and destroys my relationship with Him, with my neighbour, with myself and with His Creation. Sin is a choice away from God's plan, away from being truly human. God cannot love that. God cannot love what makes me less than He created and redeemed me to be.
These three days are the holiest of the year because they celebrate just how deeply God's love will go for us. During these three days we celebrate His victory over sin and death. Tonight we begin with His institution of His Church: the Mass and the Priesthood. Tomorrow we remember how He revealed, and saved us through, the Son's love for the Father on the Cross and in embracing suffering and death. On Saturday night we will remember the Father's response: the raising of the Son from the dead.
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