In today’s Epistle reading from Romans 2, St. Paul says, “For it is not the hearers of the law who are righteous before God, but the doers of the law who will be justified.” Fr. Gregory, in his sermon, asks “How can a person be a doer of the law without being a hearer of it? How can a person know what’s right and wrong?” The answer, St. Paul says, is that “the requirements of the law are written on their hearts, their consciences also bearing witness.”

Fr. Gregory expounds on this idea of humanity’s innate conscious. He explains that, from the beginning, God implanted in us a conscience, but sin has blurred its vision. However, we can renew and sharpen our conscience through the Holy Spirit, aided by the sacraments, including confession, and the study of the Scriptures and the Holy Fathers. Through these things, we are opened up to the Holy Spirit, which illumines God’s spiritual laws in our hearts.