Dear Friends,
Our Lenten journey begins Wednesday. The Cabrini Liturgy Committee decided to build our Lenten theme from the Gospel of the First Sunday: similar to Jesus, we are led by the Spirit into a Lenten desert of challenge and emptiness where we are invited to examine our lives and to make a choice for God. If in the process of examining our lives we find that we are not close to God, we are invited, like the prodigal son, to return to the Father who eagerly awaits our return.
The daily reading for the Thursday after Ash Wednesday features Moses laying out the basic reality that all of us have a choice to make. He says to us, “Today I have set before you life and prosperity, death and doom…”
Lent reminds us that though we are tempted to take a middle path of compromise, most of the time, that is not an option. Walking such a path often shows a lack of commitment and a refusal to follow Christ. We are invited to choose for the world and its ways or for God and the ways of holiness. Do we choose to gratify the flesh or nourish the spirit, to serve Satan and his agenda or to serve Christ and His will? That is the choice the Lenten desert presents to us.
Following Jesus is not some sort of “default position” we arrive at by accident. Faith is a Spirit-led human decision for God and all that the choice implies. Faith is a gift freely offered and which we must freely accept; it is a choice that is not forced on us. And through our daily choices, we are called to reaffirm the choice, time and again, we have made for God.
Our culture likes to proclaim the importance of choice, but we are also a culture that does not like to accept responsibility for the choices that are made. Moses goes on in Thursday’s reading to describe the fact that the choice we make for or against God will have consequences:
“If you obey the commandments of the LORD, your God,
which I enjoin on you today,
loving him, and walking in his ways,
and keeping his commandments, statutes and decrees,
you will live and grow numerous,
and the LORD, your God,
will bless you in the land you are entering to occupy.
If, however, you turn away your hearts and will not listen,
but are led astray and adore and serve other gods,
I tell you now that you will certainly perish;
you will not have a long life
on the land that you are crossing the Jordan to enter and occupy.” (Dt 30)
Choices have consequences. Little choices, over time, have a way of forming our hearts. Deeds become habits; habits become character; character becomes destiny.
Let us ask ourselves each day this Lent, “Where am I going with my life?” If we go on living an unreflective life for a long time, it is easy to find ourselves deeply locked in sinful patterns that are harder and harder to break. Now is the time to make the many little choices for following Jesus. The stakes are as high as life or death.
On Wednesday, we will apply the ashes as before but we will not make a statement over each individual, rather we will make a statement over the entire community: Repent and believe in the Gospel. The cross of ashes on our forehead will be a reminder that the desert is inviting us to make a choice.
Peace,
Fr. Damian