CCC 545 Jesus invites sinners to the table of the kingdom: “I came not to call the righteous, but sinners.”1 He invites them to that conversion without which one cannot enter the kingdom, but shows them in word and deed his Father’s boundless mercy for them and the vast “joy in heaven over one sinner who repents”.2 The supreme proof of his love will be the sacrifice of his own life “for the forgiveness of sins”.3
CCC 1443 During his public life Jesus not only forgave sins, but also made plain the effect of this forgiveness: he reintegrated forgiven sinners into the community of the People of God from which sin had alienated or even excluded them. A remarkable sign of this is the fact that Jesus receives sinners at his table, a gesture that expresses in an astonishing way both God’s forgiveness and the return to the bosom of the People of God.4
CCC 1846 The Gospel is the revelation in Jesus Christ of God’s mercy to sinners.5 The angel announced to Joseph: “You shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.”6 The same is true of the Eucharist, the sacrament of redemption: “This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.”7
1 Mk 2:17; cf. l Tim 1:15.
2 Lk 15:7; cf. 7:11-32.
3 Mt 26:28.
4 Cf. Lk 15; 19:9.
5 Cf. Lk 15.
6 Mt 1:21.
7 Mt 26:28.