Remorse is the root of all redemption.

Pacman Jones is a fallen star. He’s also, potentially, a forgiven son. After five years of felonious tomfoolery, the former Tennessee Titans and Dallas Cowboys cornerback has all but worn out his welcome in the NFL—which would be worse news if “all but” weren’t the two most promising words in the English language.

Rebellion means burning your bridges.

Repentance, on the other hand, means apologizing for the ashes.

I’m not suggesting that Jones should be cut any slack. His criminal record speaks for itself, and he’s certainly deserved the punishment he’s received. But desert isn’t necessarily deterministic. In a league where anything can happen before the last whistle, no pundit should ever start his recap before he knows the final score.

A contest isn’t over until it’s over.

A convict isn’t doomed until he’s dead.

If there’s a silver lining to Pacman’s story, it’s simply that the final chapter remains to be written.

Football fans have a soft spot for rehabilitated heroes. Ray Lewis, Randy Moss, maybe even Michael Vick—we celebrate ex-troublemakers with amnesic enthusiasm, as if we can’t remember having ever scorned them in the first place. The reason, of course, is that we all want to believe in miraculous comebacks. Bible-thumpers will argue that Jones has broken too many Commandments to reestablish himself in our good graces. I’d counter that reestablishing grace is the Good Book’s single most compelling theme.

Moral conduct is holy.

Meaningful contrition is holier.

Pacman may have strayed from the righteous path, but at least he can still retrace his wrongful steps.

The only truly lost soul is the one who won’t admit it. To wander is an act of denial; to return is a process of confession. The road home for Pacman Jones is that which runs through his own head, where all errancy ends in a guilty conscience. God gave Noah the rainbow as a sign of His infinite mercy. What that means for the floodplain’s most notorious rainmaker is a question Pacman and his demons will have to answer on their own.

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John Milton never incited a shootout at a strip club, but he did know a thing or two about pleading no contest:

They, forthwith to the place
Repairing where he judged them, prostrate fell
Before him reverent; and both confessed
Humbly their faults, and pardon begged; with tears
Watering the ground, and with their sighs the air
Frequenting, sent from hearts contrite, in sign
Of sorrow unfeigned, and humiliation meek.

Which is a wise game plan for every wayward Adam.

Because no Original Sinner is any better or worse than his next snap, and he who finds the strength to whisper "I'm sorry" may yet be saved from an eternity of only just saying, is all...