Sunday, February 21, 2021

First Sunday of Lent


Our Florida weather has been getting a bit balmy, so it's hard to realize other states are struggling with snowstorms.

 And I don’t know about you, but I have been reading signs more carefully. Here are two that made me stop and think:

         In an office:

         After tea/coffee break, empty the pots and stand upside down on the drain board.

         Outside a thrift shop:

         We exchange anything—bicycles, appliances, etc. Bring your husband or wife and get a bargain!

         Did I read these signs right?!

         Last Wednesday, we began our Lenten journey from Ashes to Easter. Lent is a time to renew ourselves, a time for a change of heart: to become more aware of God’s presence in our daily life; and to pay closer attention to the needs of one another.

         In the Gospel passage, Jesus is in the wilderness for 40 days, where he overcomes dark or evil forces of human existence, and then begins his public ministry of preaching that the kingdom of God is at hand: repent and believe in the Good News.

         My good friends, this Lenten season let us examine the course or direction of our own lives. Are we on the right track? Do we have our priorities straight? If we’re a bit off course, how can we get back in the groove?

The Church offers three Lenten practices to help us steer in the right direction: prayer, fasting and almsgiving.

Let's treat ourselves to these three ages-old disciplines of our Christian/Catholic community.

       Yes, re-treat ourselves to prayer. Prayer is an awareness of our        absolute dependency upon God, a grateful response to God for our fragile lives. Prayer simply brings to consciousness the   presence of God that is already around us and within us. Now there are many approaches to prayer: like the Our Father, the Eucharistic liturgy, and prayers of silence or petition. All of these approaches are windows or pathways into the presence         of God.

            Second, re-treat ourselves to fasting. Fasting and almsgiving are Gospel twins. Foregoing food can enable the hungry to eat. Our Lenten fast can also mean doing without anger, impatience, selfishness, negative judgments about others, excessive alcohol and addictions of one kind or another. Yes, doing without whatever prevents us from living a life of discipleship with Jesus.

            And finally almsgiving. In early Christianity there were no government agencies to provide assistance to the needy. Almsgiving was seen as an essential addition to prayer and fasting, not only in Lent, but every day. Let's re-treat ourselves to sharing what we have with others. Share our time – stay in touch with friends and loved ones, the sick, people all alone. Share our talents by volunteering wherever we can. Share our resources with needy people: how about Catholic Relief Services or St. Vincent de Paul or Catholic Charities. Share ourselves – smile more often and let others know that we want them to share our joy.

            So I invite all of us to re-discover and re-treat ourselves to prayer, fasting, and almsgiving, to refocus during these forty days on what truly matters in life: our relationship with God and our fellow human beings.

   Have a blessed Lent.