Caritas Christi Urget Nos

Category: Prayer

  • The Easter Vigil in the Holy Night

    The Easter Vigil in the Holy Night

    We should glory in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ,
    in whom is our salvation, life and resurrection,
    through whom we are saved and delivered.

    That was the entrance antiphon for this great Triduum of God’s mercy which began on Thursday night, as we gathered for the Evening Mass of the Lord’s Supper. It rightly focused these three days on the Cross, which has been and always is the altar of our salvation. Tonight is no different: the focus is on the cross, that instrument of torture and death whose evil has been ultimately and forever defeated by that for which we kept vigil this night.

    Over these past days, the Cross has become an icon of God’s love, the ladder to eternity, the linchpin of grace.  That horrible Cross was, on Holy Thursday, the threat of obscurity to a people under the thumb of the Roman Empire.  That same Cross became on Good Friday the delight of Satan, whose evil laughter we could almost hear when our Savior died.  Tonight, as we have kept vigil, we have seen that the Cross has become the altar of God’s most conclusive act of self-emptying, opening the door of grace to all of us who have already died the death of sin.  The Cross is proof that there is nothing the princes of this world, nor the prince of darkness himself, can do to thwart the salvation God offers us.  The cross is, indeed, our glory!

    On Thursday evening, we gathered for the Mass of the Lord’s Supper. Father James taught us that union with Christ is union with the whole Christ. That the love of Christ has to be poured out in every situation according to our life’s vocation and station in life. That that love has to sanctify the priest and his congregation, the parent and the child, the Christian with the stranger in need. Because it was Christ who showed us that way, and poured his love on us, washing our feet and feeding us with the Eucharist.

    Yesterday afternoon, we gathered for the Liturgy of the Lord’s Passion. I talked about the crosses we all bear and unite with the cross of Our Lord, and how we see our own disfigurement on the face of the suffering servant hanging on the Cross.

    As we have kept Vigil here on this Holy Night, we have heard the stories of our salvation.  We have seen that time and time again, God has broken through the history of our brokenness, has triumphed over the lure of sin, and has redirected his chosen ones to the path of life.  Salvation history has brought us to the fullness of this night, not just a memorial of the Resurrection, but a real sharing in Christ’s triumph.  This is the night when Christ makes the ultimate Passover; leading us through the Red Sea of his blood, poured out for us, holding back the raging waters of sin and death, and guiding us, his brothers and sisters, into the Promised Land of salvation.  This is the night when the fire of his love blazes for all eternity to provide an enduring light in our dark world.  This is the night when our faith tells us that we are not the same as the rest of the world; we are a people set apart from all that drags humanity down to death.  This is the night when death itself is defeated by Christ our God rising from the depths of the underworld!

    God delights in the freedom of will that we possess as a natural part of who we are because it gives us the opportunity to freely choose to love him, as he freely chooses to love us.  But he knows that same free will can and will also lead us astray, into sin, into evil.  The free choice to love God is a greater good than the absence of evil, so not imbuing us with free will was never an option.  Instead, the evil of our sin is redeemed on this most holy of all nights, this night which “dispels wickedness, washes faults away, restores innocence to the fallen, and joy to mourners, drives out hatred, fosters concord, and brings down the mighty.”

    And so it is fitting that this night is the night when we also focus on Baptism.  Everything is in place: the waters of the Red Sea are parted, the pillar of fire glows to the honor of God, we are led to grace and joined to God’s holy ones of every time and place, Christ emerges triumphant from the underworld and the sin of Adam is redeemed forever.  And so our Elect in a few moments will enter the waters of Baptism, renouncing the prince of darkness, professing faith in God, dying with Christ in the waters, emerging to new life, triumphant with Christ, and encountering the bright morning star whose light blazes for all eternity.  We will hold our breath as the waters flow over them, and sing Alleluia when they are reborn, crying out the praise of God with all the joy the Church can muster!

    This is the night that redeems all our days and nights.  This is the night when sin and death are rendered impotent by the fruitful plunging of the Paschal candle, the Light of Christ, into the waters of Baptism.  This is the night that even the Cross, that instrument of cruelty and death, is transfigured, redeemed to the praise and honor and glory of God!

    Christ is indeed the Morning Star who never sets, the one whose glorious light shines brightly to burst the darkness of sin and the grave, the one who cheated death of its hold on us, and shines the bright light of his presence on a world grown cold and dark, the one who lives and reigns for ever and ever.

    Christ is risen!
    He is risen indeed!  Alleluia!

  • Holy Saturday Lauds (Morning Prayer)

    Holy Saturday Lauds (Morning Prayer)

    Today, the Church asks us to do something that is almost impossible for we modern people to do, and that is to be silent. Today, we continue to keep the Paschal Fast until the end of the Easter Vigil. That means we eat less, speak less, do less – all to keep the silence of this time.  This is the time that has Jesus in the tomb.  This is the time where Jesus descends into hell.

    We don’t rush the resurrection, because we need to sit in the uncertainty and wait for the working out of our salvation. It’s not unlike the uncertainty we experience when we are awaiting test results for a serious illness. Or when one job ends and a new opportunity has yet to open up. Or when a relationship breaks and we have to wait our way through the healing. The uncertainty, the meanwhile, requires us to sit in the silence and await salvation.

    There is a lot going on in the meanwhile, even though we don’t see it. There was on that first Holy Saturday. An ancient homily for this day puts it this way:

    Something strange is happening—there is a great silence on earth today, a great silence and stillness. The whole earth keeps silence because the King is asleep. The earth trembled and is still because God has fallen asleep in the flesh and he has raised up all who have slept ever since the world began. God has died in the flesh and hell trembles with fear.

    He has gone to search for our first parent, as for a lost sheep. Greatly desiring to visit those who live in darkness and in the shadow of death, he has gone to free from sorrow the captives Adam and Eve, he who is both God and the son of Eve. The Lord approached them bearing the cross, the weapon that had won him the victory. At the sight of him Adam, the first man he had created, struck his breast in terror and cried out to everyone: “My Lord be with you all.” Christ answered him: “And with your spirit.” He took him by the hand and raised him up, saying: “Awake, O sleeper, and rise from the dead, and Christ will give you light.”

    Tonight our Elect – and one infant! – are to be baptized into Christ. Tonight we will hear the stories of salvation and keep vigil for our Risen Lord. That’s tonight. For now, we fast and pray and keep silence, letting the significance of this moment sink in, waiting for the working out of our salvation.

    And maybe we join our waiting to the wisdom of Saint Joseph, whose silence throughout the Gospel allowed the salvation of all the world to be worked out.

  • Good Friday of the Passion of Our Lord

    Good Friday of the Passion of Our Lord

    Today’s readings

    These holy days, this Sacred Paschal Triduum, are all about the Cross. In these moments, the cross takes center stage: it is, in fact the focal point of the Gospel. At his birth into our world, he was laid in a wooden manger, that wood that is the precursor of the wood of the cross. Throughout his public ministry, he journeyed to the cross which was the reason for his coming. And today, he mounts the altar of the cross as the priest, the altar, and the lamb of sacrifice, given for us.

    There can be no greater demonstration of God’s love for us than we have in these days. We broken ones, the ones who incurred the sentence of death, have that sentence served by God the Word, the One who was with the father in the beginning, the One through whom all things were made. Our God is just and there is a price for sin. But our God is mercy and there is forgiveness and redemption and salvation.

    Isaiah’s lament in today’s first reading catches us up in the emotion of Good Friday.  The suffering servant’s appearance is so marred, stricken and infirm that we cannot bear to look at him.  Because if we really looked hard enough, we know, in our heart of hearts, that the marring, the strickenness, the infirmity are all ours. All ours! This is a dark hour.  It seems like all is lost. 

    We too will have dark hours of our own.  That’s one of the few guarantees that this fleeting life gives us.  We absolutely will have to bear our own cross of suffering: the illness or death of loved ones, the loss of a job, the splintering of a family, or even the shame of addictive sin.

    It is our brokenness that we see in the suffering servant, our sinfulness on the son of man.  And this suffering one is embodied by our God, Jesus Christ our Savior, who carries all of that nastiness to the cross, and hangs there before us, bleeding and dying and crying out to the Father.  That’s our sin, our death, our punishment – and he bore it all for us.  Who could believe what we have seen?

    And just when it seems like there is nothing left to give, when it seems like all hope is lost, when it seems like death has the upper hand, the soldier thrusts his lance into the side of Christ, and our Jesus gives still more and yet again: he pours forth the life blood and water that plants the seeds of the Church into the barren ground of the earth, guaranteeing the presence of the Lord in the world until the end of time.  Christ our God gives everything he has for us, takes away all that divides us, and performs the saving sacrifice that makes salvation possible for all people.  Our God gives up everything – everything – for love of us.

    We have the eyes of salvation history, we who have grown up in the Church. So we know that the suffering and death of Jesus is not the end of the story.  In the day ahead, we will keep vigil for the Resurrection of the Lord which shatters the hold that sin and death have on us.  We are a people who eagerly yearn for the Resurrection.  We must certainly hope for the great salvation that is ours, and the light and peace of God’s Kingdom.  But not today: today we remember that that salvation was bought at a very dear price, the price of the death of our Savior, our great High Priest.  Today we look back on all of our sufferings of the past or the present, we even look ahead to those that may yet be.  We see all those sufferings in our suffering servant on the cross.  And as we sit here in God’s presence we know that we are never ever alone in those dark hours, that Christ has united himself to us in his suffering and death.  As we come forward to venerate the Cross, we bring with us our own crosses: past, present, and future, and join them to the sufferings of Christ. In these moments, we unite ourselves to him in our own suffering, and walk confidently through it with him, passing the gates of salvation, and entering one great day into God’s heavenly kingdom.

    We adore you, O Christ and we bless you:
    Because by your holy cross you have redeemed the world.

  • Palm Sunday of the Passion of Our Lord

    Palm Sunday of the Passion of Our Lord

    Today’s readings

    Sometimes, when I take a step back in preparing for our Palm Sunday Mass, my head spins a little bit.  That’s because this is no ordinary celebration of Mass.  We have two Gospel readings: one at the beginning of Mass for the blessing of the palms, and one very long one in the normal spot in the Liturgy of the Word. And those two Gospel readings couldn’t be more different in tone!  The first one tells of Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem, and it seems so triumphant. The crowds welcomed him and paraded with him into the city.  But then we get to the Passion reading and everything changes in a heartbeat.

    I think if we had to sum up the Liturgy today with a contemporary quip, it might be, “Well, that escalated quickly!”  We go from “Hosanna!  Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!”  to “Crucify him! Crucify him!  Give us Barabbas!” just two chapters later! This, friends, really is the hour for which Jesus came.  The hour for him to lay down his life.

    It seems like things have escalated quickly, but really we know they didn’t.  All through the Gospel, Jesus has been getting under the skin of the religious establishment, calling out their weak and self-serving adherence to the Law, taking care of the real needs of people as they should have been, and showing people a way of life based not on legalism, but on caritas, love poured out in service to others.  That he will punctuate that caritas love at the end of the Gospel today is quite instructive.  The whole of the Gospel centers around laying down our lives for others.

    And, really, if we take a big picture view of the history of salvation, things haven’t escalated that quickly at all.  All through the scriptures, Old and New Testaments alike, people – we – have been missing the point.  The cycle of sin that spirals all through the scriptures has seen God send messages, through signs and prophets, of how things had gone wrong and what needed to be done.  And all through the scriptures, people have heeded the message only in lip service, or have outright murdered the prophets who brought the message.  And yet again, God sent new messages, and yet again, the people sinned.  We know that the sacrifice of Christ, God made man, was always God’s plan for salvation.  It has been incubating for generations, and now, finally, the hour has come.

    Honestly, though, we know things have continued to escalate.  Wars in Ukraine, Russia, Israel, and Gaza are decimating cities and killing thousands every day. The migrant crisis finds people coming to our nation with nothing, and being pawns in a great political argument, all while testing the ability of cities to care for them and take them in. Crime and terrorism abounds, and we find ourselves in the middle of an election cycle in which people use all these heartbreaking issues to advance their careers, their own agendas, and the coffers of their allies and supporters.  All of this almost causes Our Lord to fall a fourth time, crushed under the weight of the cross.  We certainly need a Simon of Cyrene to help us shoulder the burden of it all, and a Veronica to wipe the blood and sweat from Christ’s face once again.  People walk the Way of the Cross over and over, and the hour of Christ’s Passion seems to always be present.

    Who are we going to blame for this?  Whose fault is it that they crucified my Lord?  Is it the Jews, as many centuries of anti-Semitism would assert?  Was it the Romans, those foreign occupiers who sought only the advancement of their empire?  Was it the fickle crowds, content enough to marvel at Jesus when he fed the thousands, but abandoning him once his message was made clear?  Was it Peter, who couldn’t even keep his promise of standing by his friend for a few hours?  Was it the rest of the apostles, who scattered lest they be tacked up on a cross next to Jesus?  Was it Judas, who gave in to despair thinking he had it all wrong?  Was it the cowardly Herod and Pilate who were both manipulating the event in order to maintain their pathetic fiefdoms?  Who was it who put Jesus on that cross?  Even now, who do we blame for the death of our Lord?

    And the answer, as we well know, is that it is, and always was, me.  Because it’s my sins that led Jesus to the Way of the Cross.   I have been the selfish one.  I have been the one who has looked down on people who are different from me, using my privilege at their expense.  I have been the one that has withheld love and forgiveness and grace in so many different ways.  I have been comfortable with my sins and content to stay the way I am.  It’s my sins that betrayed my Jesus; it’s my sins that have kept me from friendship with God. 

    But as ugly as I have been, as much as I have nailed him to the cross, even so: he willingly came to this hour and gave his life that I might have life. 

    And you.

    He gave himself for us.

  • Saturday of the Fifth Week of Lent

    Saturday of the Fifth Week of Lent

    Today’s readings

    Caiaphas had no idea how prophetic his words were. Actually, as far as the intent of his words went, they were nothing but selfish. The Jews didn’t want to lose their standing with the Romans. As it was, they had an uneasy peace. The Romans pretty much let them practice their religion as long as there wasn’t any trouble. But they knew that if everyone started following Jesus, the Romans would give preference to the new way, in order to keep the peace. The religious leaders couldn’t let that happen, so they began plotting in earnest to kill Jesus, planning to find him when he came to celebrate the upcoming feast day, which they were certain he would attend.

    It’s a time of high intrigue, and for Jesus, his hour – the hour of his Passion – is fast approaching. That’s so clear in the Gospel readings in these last days of Lent. In just a few hours we will begin our celebration of Holy Week, waving palms to welcome our king, and praying through his passion and death. It is an emotional time for us as we know our God has given his life for us, the most amazing gift we will ever get. It is also a time of sadness because we know our sins have nailed him to the cross.

    But, this is where the significance of Caiaphas’s words brings us joy. Yes, it is better for one person to die than the whole nation. God knew that well when he sent his only Son to be our salvation. Jesus took our place, nailing our sins and brokenness to the cross, dying to pay the price those sins required, and rising to bring the salvation we could never attain on our own. Caiaphas was right. It was better for one person to die than for the whole nation to die. Amazing as it seems, that was God’s plan all along.

  • Friday of the Fifth Week of Lent

    Friday of the Fifth Week of Lent

    Today’s readings
    Mass for the school children.

    Have you ever thought that everyone in the whole world was against you? Sometimes it seems that way, for sure. We all go through times like that.  Of course, it’s not true; there are always people who believe in you.  But if you’ve ever felt like it was true, you’re not alone: we’ve all been there some time or another in our lives. 

    Maybe someone was telling lies about you and trying to get others to work against you, or maybe they were looking for any time you did the slightest thing wrong, or messed up in any way, so they could act all superior or get you in trouble. Or maybe they even sabotage you or tell stores about you behind your back.  It’s frustrating when that happens.  So since we’ve all been there, I think we might understand a little of how the prophet Jeremiah, King David, and Jesus may have felt in today’s readings and psalm.

    Jeremiah was one of the Old Testament prophets, and a prophet’s job is never easy. Nobody wants to hear what they don’t want to hear.  People don’t want to hear that they are wrong, and they don’t want others to tell them what to do. The prophets had to tell the people what God wanted and how God wanted them to live, and they didn’t find that welcome at all.  It can be difficult to stand up for what’s right.  So for Jeremiah, things are getting dangerous: people disliked what he was saying so much that they wanted him dead.  The same is true for Jesus in today’s Gospel reading.  Jesus now is rapidly approaching the cross; it’s almost the hour for him to give his life.

    And so the psalm today is kind of the prayer of both of them, and really all of those who are suffering at the hands of an enemy.  King David in the psalm finds that his enemies are pursuing him to the point of death, like the waters of the deep overwhelming a drowning man.

    But all of them find their refuge in God: God never leaves us alone in our troubles.  Jeremiah writes, “For he has rescued the life of the poor from the power of the wicked!”  King David takes consolation in the fact that “From his temple he heard my voice, and my cry to him reached his ears.”  And for Jesus, well, his time was coming close, but it had not yet come.

    When we are provoked like they were, how do we respond?  Is our first thought to take refuge in God, or do we try to solve the problem on our own? Or maybe we even try to get back at those who are attacking us. Those last two options never ever work.  If we don’t turn to God, we will sooner or later find those waves overwhelming us, because there is always a limit to our own power, a limit to what we can do all by ourselves. 

    But God never expects us to do the right thing all alone.  He knows that it’s hard for us to stand up for what’s right, to do the right thing when everyone seems to be doing something else, to speak up for those who are struggling when everyone else is making fun of them.  God always expects us to do the right thing, of course: that’s what he made us for.  But he doesn’t expect us to do the right thing on our own.  He will give us the power to stand strong in the midst of trouble – we just have to ask.  If we do things on our own, we have no one to turn to when things go wrong or when things get tough.  But if we turn to God, even if things don’t improve on our own timetable, we will always find refuge and safety in our God: there will be strength to get through, and we will never be alone.

  • Tuesday of the Fourth Week of Lent

    Tuesday of the Fourth Week of Lent

    Today’s readings

    “Do you want to be well?”

    That had to be a jarring question to the man at the waters of Bethesda. I wonder if he was thinking, “Of course I want to be well! Why do you think I’ve been lying here so long?” But it’s an important question for him to answer: Jesus can’t heal someone who has become entrenched in his or her own illness to the point that they just accept it. But he tells Jesus his plight, and accepts the command to rise and walk, and with that he is healed.

    In these Lenten days, the Elect among us – those preparing for the Easter Sacraments of initiation – are lying at the waters of Bethesda. Those waters are the waters of Baptism, which will be stirred up at the Easter Vigil. They will be taken down to the waters by their sponsors, and they will be baptized into the faith. What a glorious night that will be!

    In these Lenten days, we find ourselves lying at the waters of our own Bethesda, too (Bethesda means “House of Mercy). We find ourselves sick with sin, and needing the waters of Baptism to be stirred up in our own lives so that we can be made well, so that we can rise and walk. We are more than half way through Lent, and so it is time that we reflect on our sin and answer Jesus’ question, “Do you want to be well?” Because he stands ready to stir up the waters and command us to rise and walk. This is the time for a good Lenten confession if we haven’t made one yet. This Sunday we will have 15 priests to hear confessions. Those waters will be plenty stirred up.

    So, do you want to be well?

  • The Second Sunday of Lent

    The Second Sunday of Lent

    Today’s readings

    What would you give up for love?

    That’s the question I want us to focus on today because I think it is, perhaps, the question of the spiritual life.  What is it that we are willing to give up for love?  And I’ll be honest: this set of readings gets me every time.  When I see what Abraham, Jesus, and ultimately God the Father would give up for love, it makes me repentant of the shoddy things I tend to hang on to.  But let’s bookmark that for a bit and get into the readings we have today.

    Today’s first reading puts poor Abraham in an awful position.  Remember, he and Sarah were childless well into their old age.  And it is only upon entering into relationship with God that that changes.  God gives them a son, along with a promise, that he would be the father of many nations.  It’s unbelievable. Think of anyone you know who has had to struggle with the pain of being childless.  And here God puts an end to that just when they have come to terms with the fact it was never going to happen. Everything changes for them, an old and childless couple.

    And so now put yourself in Abraham’s place.  After rejoicing in the son he never thought he’d have, God tells him: “Take your son Isaac, your only one, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah.  There you shall offer him up as a holocaust on a height that I will point out to you.”  It’s not a suggestion, it’s not an invitation, it’s an order.  Now, Abraham knows that it’s only because of the gift of God that he has Isaac to sacrifice in the first place.  But for those of you who are parents: think about it, what would you do?  How would you feel in that moment?  That boy is the answer to your life-long prayers, and now God wants him back.  Wow.

    The reading omits a chunk in the middle that is perhaps the most poignant part.  Abraham packs up and takes his son on a journey, travels with some servants, and at the end of it, he and Isaac haul the wood and the torch up the mountain.  Isaac asks him: “Here are the fire and the wood, but where is the sheep for the burnt offering?”  Can you even begin to imagine the anguish in poor Abraham’s heart?  And yet he responds in faith: “My son, God will provide the sheep for the burnt offering.”  Which, of course is absolutely true.  God had provided Isaac, who was intended to be the sheep.  God had, indeed, provided Isaac.  But Abraham couldn’t have known that God would intervene, couldn’t have imagined what God had in mind.

    Now, we could get caught up in the injustice here and call God to task for asking such a horrible thing in the first place.  Why would God test poor Abraham like this?  Why would he give him a son in his old age, only to take him away?   What purpose did that serve?  And who wants to worship a God who would do something like that?  But we have to know that the purpose of the story is to illustrate that God has salvation in mind; that he always intends the good for us.  Yes, God would provide the lamb.  It was never going to be Isaac; it’s not even the sheep caught up in the thicket – not really.  We know that the sheep for the burnt offering is none other than God’s own Son, his only one, whom he loves.  The story is ultimately about Jesus, and his death and resurrection are what’s really going on in today’s Liturgy of the Word.

    So let’s let that sink in for a minute.  No, of course we don’t want to worship a God who would be evil enough to give a couple the gift of a child in their old age and then demand that he be sacrificed.  But we certainly worship this God who, in his great love for us, sacrifices his Son, his only one, whom he loves.  That, friends, is our God.  That’s what all of this is all about.

    Now let’s get back to the thought I asked you to bookmark at the beginning of my homily today: Abraham trusted God and was willing to give up the thing he’d probably die for – his own son.  God asked, and he, anguished as he must have been, made the preparations and was ready to do it.  That’s what love of God meant to him.  So what are we willing to give so that we can demonstrate – to ourselves if to no one else – our trust in God’s ability to love us beyond all telling?  For Lent, we’ve given up chocolate, or sweets, or even negative thinking or swearing.  Maybe we’ve been successful, or perhaps have not done well with them, or maybe we have even given up giving up the things we gave up!  But we need to see in Abraham’s willingness that our sacrifices, however big or small they are, are important; they mean something.  So maybe now, still early in Lent, it’s time to take a second look at our Lenten sacrifices.  Can we go deeper?  What are we willing to give up to experience God’s love more fully?

    Jesus goes up a mountain in today’s readings too – and when he does, he sees that he is to become the sheep for the sacrifice – sooner rather than later.  That was the meaning of the Law and the prophets of old, symbolized by Moses and Elijah on the mountain.  But knowing that, and knowing what’s at stake, he does not hesitate for a moment to go down the mountain and soldier on to be that great sacrifice. He willingly gives his own life to be the sheep for the sacrifice, because leaving us in our sins was a price he was not willing to pay.  His life was the thing he was willing to give up for love; for love of us. There are a lot of things out there for us that seem good.  But the only supreme good is the life of heaven, and eternity with our God.  Think of the thing that means everything to you: are you willing to sacrifice that to gain heaven?  Are you willing to give everything for love of God?

    Because, for you, for me, God did.

    God did that for us.

  • The First Sunday of Lent

    The First Sunday of Lent

    Today’s readings

    “Repent and believe in the Gospel.”

    I think, in general, as a people, we are allergic to repentance.

    The year was 2012, and it was the first year that we used the revised translation of the Roman Missal.  On Ash Wednesday, as I do every year, I used both of the prescribed verses when applying ashes: “Remember you are dust, and to dust you shall return” and “Repent and believe in the Gospel.”  The latter of which is taken from the end of today’s Gospel reading.  I got two rather vivid complaints from people to whom I used that latter verse, which ran something along the lines of “why would you tell me to repent?”

    The systemic nature of this allergy to repentance is magnified by the fact that almost anything is permissible these days: aborting a baby at full term, having illicit relationships, lying in public office, inciting violence, mass shootings, rampant crime, and so many more.  These are all pervasive; they never go away, and every day they just get worse.

    On the other hand, repentance is almost discouraged by a cancel culture that refuses to forgive anyone for any mistake, intended or unintended.  No one is allowed a second chance, no one is ever encouraged to turn over a new leaf.  As the late Cardinal George once said, “contemporary culture permits everything and forgives nothing.” He was a wise observer of contemporary humanity.

    Nevertheless, Jesus is clear in our Gospel today: “Repent and believe in the Gospel.” Because our God is a God who encourages repentance. He wants everyone to come to salvation, but justice demands that salvation requires a heart ready to receive it; justice requires repentance.

    Repentance is easy, but it’s also incredibly hard.  It’s hard because we are of this society allergic to repentance. It’s hard because we believe everything is “okay for me.” It’s hard because we have been conditioned to look out for number one, to “be true to yourself,” to do what seems right to you. But there is such a thing as eternal Truth, which our society also does not recognize, and that Truth reminds us that some things are always wrong, and we must abandon the notion that some times everything is okay.  So repentance requires what the Greek language calls “metanoia,” which means literally turning around and going in the other direction, in this case, going toward the Truth, who is our God.

    So we have to apologize, we have to stop doing the wrong thing, and we have to turn back to God who is always waiting for us.  That’s repentance. That’s what justice demands, and that’s what salvation requires.

    I said repentance was easy, but also hard.  It’s easy because all we need to do is turn back to him. And we can do that by coming to confession and receiving the Lord’s forgiveness. We can do that in our prayer life by turning our thoughts and affections to him. One of my favorite ways to put myself into God’s presence is to pray the Jesus prayer: “Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner.” It’s an ancient prayer of the Church, it’s a good act of contrition, and it’s a wonderful mantra to pray over and over in times of temptation, fear, or frustration. It’s a wonderful way to open ourselves up to repentance.

    Friends, those people who were mad at me in 2011 didn’t realize it, but we all need to repent. Even me; maybe even especially me. We all have times when we’re headed in the wrong direction. And on those times we need to turn around, to turn back to God, to repent, to confess our sins, and to accept the love and healing grace that our God offers so freely.

    If during Lent you do nothing else, please learn to accept the need for repentance. Society may forgive nothing, but our God forgives everything, if we turn back to him with all our heart, and that’s all he wants. Give God your heart this Lent and see what he does with it.

    Repent and believe in the Gospel.

  • Thursday after Ash Wednesday

    Thursday after Ash Wednesday

    Today’s readings

    “If anyone wishes to come after me, he must deny himself
    and take up his cross daily and follow me.”

    You know, in my life, I’ve found that that quote is very easy to accept until a cross actually presents itself. Then, when the cross shows up, there’s an overwhelming sense of despair. But Lent is supposed to teach us how to take up the cross. The fasting, almsgiving, and prayer that we have taken up, or are about to take up, don’t mean anything unless we give them to Jesus and ask him to help us with the cross, whether it’s the cross we are currently bearing, or a cross in the future. It’s like going to the gym and training our muscles so that we can do our work and care for ourselves and our loved ones. Faith is like a muscle: it has to be trained so that we can have it in our times of need.  How will our Lenten penance help us to take up our crosses?