To live an authentically human life, we must love truth very much, which is, in a certain sense, something sacred that requires to be treated with respect and love. The truth is sometimes so obscured by sin, passions and materialism that, if we do not love it, it would not be possible to recognize it. It is so easy to accept lies when they come to the aid of laziness, vanity, sensuality, false prestige...! Sometimes the cause of insincerity is vainglory, pride, the fear of being disgraced.
The Lord loves this virtue so much that He declared of Himself: I am the Truth, while the devil is a liar and the father of lies, all that he promises is falsehood. Jesus will ask the Father for His own, for us, that they may be sanctified in the truth.
There is much talk today of being sincere, of being authentic or similar words, and yet men tend to hide themselves in anonymity and often to disguise the true motives of their actions before themselves and others. Before God, too, they try to remain anonymous and avoid a personal encounter with Him in prayer and in the examination of conscience. However, we cannot be good Christians if we are not sincere with ourselves, with God and with others. We men are sometimes afraid of the truth because it is demanding and compromising. And at certain times we may be tempted to use dissimulation, a little deception, half-truth, the lie itself; at other times, we may be tempted to change the name of facts or things so that telling the truth as it is will not be strident.
Sincerity is a Christian virtue of the first order. And we could not be good Christians if we did not live it to its ultimate consequences Sincerity with ourselves leads us to recognize our faults, without concealing them, without seeking false justifications; it makes us always alert to the temptation to "fabricate" the truth for ourselves, to pretend that what suits us is true, as do those who try to deceive themselves by saying that "for them" something forbidden by the Law of God is not a sin. Subjectivity, passions, lukewarmness can contribute to not being sincere with oneself. The person who does not live this radical sincerity easily deforms his conscience and becomes interiorly blind to the things of God.
Another frequent way of deceiving oneself is not wanting to draw the consequences of the truth so as not to have to face them, or not to tell the whole truth: "You never want to "exhaust the truth." -Sometimes, out of correctness. Others - the most - for not giving yourself a hard time. Some, not to give you a hard time. And, always, out of cowardice.
"Thus, with this fear of delving, you'll never be a man of judgment".
To be sincere, the first means we have to use is prayer: to ask the Lord to see the errors, the defects of character..., to give us the strength to recognize them as such, and the courage to ask for help and to fight. Secondly, the daily examination of conscience, brief but effective, to get to know ourselves. Then, spiritual direction and Confession, really opening the soul, telling the whole truth, with the desire to know our intimacy so that they can help us in our journey towards God. "Do not allow that in your soul nest a focus of rottenness, even if it is very small. Speak. When water flows, it is clean; when it stagnates, it forms a puddle full of disgusting filth, and from drinking water it becomes a breeding ground for vermin." Often it will help us to be sincere to say in the first place that which is most difficult for us.
If we reject this mute demon, with the help of grace, we will see that one of the immediate fruits of sincerity is joy and peace of soul. This is why we ask God for this virtue, for ourselves and for others.