23. If "the flesh" is, as Paul suggests, the key problem in human existence, to what extent is it simply an inevitable component of being human? And, conversely, to what extent can it be considered a sin—as if to say, "something that violates our essential humanity"? Christians have typically wanted to separate these two things sharply, often on the ground that, after all, we cannot be culpable for faults that lie in our deepest nature. Human life is full of faults that are the consequence of ignorance or other inability on our part. We do a great deal of harm to one another and to the world around us without fully realizing what we are doing. We may be hustled along by the force of circumstances, blinded by misconceptions built so firmly into our culture that we cannot recognize them as harmful, either inhibited or catapulted into action by psychological quirks that override further reflection.
The cause of these wrongs is our finitude, but the harm is not the less grave for that. Insofar as all finite life is life in the flesh, there can never be a perfect human life. There cannot even be a perfectly examined life, since the self-understanding of even the most self-critical among us will never be more than partial.