There is still time!

There is still time!

Lent is almost over as we now reach Holy Week. A time fit for a self-examination, of how well we lived the Lenten Season according to our talents. Even if the answer for this question is that we didn’t do everything we could to try be better Christians ourselves, there is still time to live this Holy Week as holy as we can, or at least a little bit better than we did during Lent.

In the beginning of this Lent, the priest in my parish said something I was also thinking for some years already! That Lent is much more than giving up chocolate, soda (or pop, like the north says it!) or any other little sacrifice for the whole 40 days! It is more than giving up social media, for that matter, as well! It must be something that will actually help you have presence of God and help you become better Christians. But we are still missing the biggest point!

When I was living in Temple, TX, in my second year married, thus my second year in the US, I was living a very intense lent, I remember. When it was over, a few days after Easter Sunday, I was at church and a retired former pastor of that parish, I believe he was from Germany, was celebrating daily Mass that day! I think that during the four years I lived in Temple, he celebrated Mass there no more than three times. Anyway, during the homily he said something that I remember even now! Something I have never heard, or least not so clearly:

“I don’t know why people think that when Lent is over, all the sacrifices and intense prayer should cease. Lent is a preparation for Easter. If it is only a preparation, it means we should be even holier after Easter.”

That struck me really hard. I was so relieved Lent was over so I could relax a bit, but as that priest made me see, I was getting it all wrong!

I’m not saying that since that homily I dramatically changed, and that I had always followed that admonition! In fact, I have not! But it helps me keep things in perspective and helps me understand better the things I do, the things I plan to do during Lent!

So back to the beginning, how well not eating chocolate will help you be a better person, a new person for Easter (Easter in its origin means “new life”). It can help, of course, but only if you are thinking that by doing a specific food sacrifice, it will help you not binge any longer in the future! That you will be less a slave of food, or other earthly pleasures, and more spiritually free!

So, yes, all kinds of sacrifices can help you live a good lent in preparation for your new life, but the reasoning should not be lost in these 40 days, and not be totally forgotten after Easter. I know that I always need to work on this, every year!

And as a last thought, during Palm Sunday Mass, we read the whole text of the Passion of Christ. This year a specific part caught my attention! It was the very brief part that mentions Simon of Cyrene being caught coming back from a long day of work on the field, and forced to help carry the Cross of Jesus.

It made me think. Simon of Cyrene was probably a very righteous Jew! He was probably married, with children, a hard-working man, living a righteous life, somehow comfortably! And yet, he was totally unaware that in that precise day the city officials were to crucify Jesus in such a public manifestation! Has he even heard of Jesus before?

Are we not like him? Yes, I am specifically talking about us: somehow good christian folks. Are our lives just a bit too comfortable? A little too much - willingly unaware of the troubles and happenings around us? But we are called into the scene, as Simon of Cyrene was forced to! We are called to get out of our own little world and do something bigger! We are called to be bothered. I know that I need to work on this as well! Just thought I would share!



There is still time!