"There is in us an instinct for newness, for renewal, for a liberation of creative power. We seek to awaken in ourselves a force which really changes our lives from within. And yet the same instinct tells us that this change is a recovery of that which is deepest, most original, most personal in ourselves. To be born again is not to become somebody else, but to become ourselves."(Thomas Merton) Wow! Isn’t this what happens in Baptism and in Reconciliation, if we have separated ourselves from God through mortal sin? These two sacraments don’t make us "somebody else", but the person we were in the mind of God before the world began. We were willed into being by God to be his adopted sons or daughters. But because of the sin of Adam, our self-identity was warped to be one who is alienated from God. The rebirth that takes place in Baptism and in the Sacrament of Reconciliation restores our true identity, our true worth, our true inheritance, by becoming ourselves.