Lent – A Season of Penance and of Hope
Once again, we are in the Lenten season and are reminded of the Church’s admonition when ashes were placed on our foreheads on Ash Wednesday: “… remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return” (Gen. 3:19). Despite this reminder we sometimes forget that without God we are nothing.
The Church thus calls us to “turn away from sin and be faithful to the Gospel.” Lent is a time of penance and interior renewal. God wants us to return to him by detaching ourselves from the things of this world. We must try not “to serve two masters” (Mt. 6:24). We must love God with our whole heart and soul, and flee from any deliberate sin in our lives. Christ is looking for a contrite heart within us, a heart that acknowledges its weakness and sins and is prepared to shed itself of them. God wants from us a genuine sorrow for our sins by going to sacramental confession, and by doing small deeds of mortification and penance out of love. True conversion is shown by the way we behave towards our family and those around us, and by our sincere desire to amend our lives. Lent is a time for coming closer to God.
During Lent, the Church highly recommends for the faithful to do more of the following three practices:
1.) prayer,
2.) sacrifice through fasting and abstinence, and
3.) works of mercy (such as almsgiving and the various corporal and spiritual works of mercy).
According to St. Peter Chrysologus, Bishop and Doctor of the Church, in one of his homilies: “Prayer, mercy and fasting … are one, and they give life to each other. Fasting is the soul of prayer, mercy is the lifeblood of fasting. Let no one try to separate them; they cannot be separated. If you have only one of them or not all together, you have nothing.
So if you pray, fast; if you fast, show mercy; if you want your petition to be heard, hear the petition of others. If you do not close your ear to others you open God’s ear to yourself. When you fast, see the fasting of others. If you want God to know that you are hungry, know that another is hungry. If you hope for mercy, show mercy. If you look for kindness, show kindness. If you want to receive, give. If you ask for yourself what you deny to others, your asking is a mockery. Show mercy to others in the same way, with the same generosity, with the same promptness, as you want others to show mercy to you… Fasting bears no fruit unless it is watered by mercy. Fasting dries up when mercy dries up. Mercy is to fasting as rain is to the earth… When you fast, if your mercy is thin, your harvest will be thin; when you fast, what you pour out in mercy overflows into your barn. Therefore, do not lose by saving, but gather in by scattering. Give to the poor, and you give to yourself. You will not be allowed to keep what you have refused to give to others.”
Lent is a graced time of the year during which we can exercise discipline in the ordinary things of life as we prepare for the glory of Easter, the celebration of Christ’s victory over death and sin. In any human endeavor – sports, military, business or life in general – there can be no victory without sacrifice and self-discipline. The same discipline is true in the spiritual realm.
Examples of this discipline are many in the areas of prayer, fasting and charitable works of mercy We must take time during the season of Lent to learn how to pray a little extra so that we can focus our attention on Jesus Christ. Pray the Rosary every day (or once a week, or 3 times a week, etc.) of Lent, or the Chaplet of Divine Mercy. Assist at Holy Mass, the highest form of prayer, perhaps one or more days during the week as a preparation for the great gift of the Paschal mystery which unfolds during Holy Week.
Discipline yourself to be more recollected and reverent at the Eucharist, realizing that this is nothing less than the same sacrifice of Calvary offered in a sacramental manner.
During Lent, the Church asks for signs of our penance such as
1.) Friday abstinence from meat for those from the age of 14,
2.) fasting (only one-full meal during the Fridays of fast) for those between ages of 18 and 59 unless prevented by poor health, and
3.) various forms of mortifications.
Fasting will always be one clear sign of the spirit of penance that God asks of man. When it is accompanied by prayer, fasting is a manifestation of humility before God. The one who fasts turns towards God in an attitude of total dependence and abandonment. In Holy Scripture, we see how fasting and other works of penance were performed before the commencement of any difficult task, to implore forgiveness for sin, to obtain an end to a calamity, to gain the grace needed for the fulfillment of a mission, etc.
Other forms of penance - detachment from material goods, mortification and abstinence purify us from our sins and help us to find God in our everyday life. For “whoever seeks God while wanting to hold on to his own likes and dislikes, may seek Him day and night, but will never find Him” (St. John of the Cross, The Spiritual Canticle, 1,3). Our daily duties are the principal source for this mortification: order, punctuality at work, concentration and intensity we bring to it, etc.
“And the best mortification is that which overcomes the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life in little things throughout the day. Ours should be mortifications which do not mortify others… You are not mortified if you are touchy; if your every thought is for yourself; if you humiliate others; if you do not know how to give up what is unnecessary and , at times , what is necessary; if you become gloomy because things don’t turn out the way you had hoped” (J. Escriva, Christ is passing by, 9).
Deny the inclination to bicker and complain. Perhaps there is someone who rubs you the wrong way. Love the person whether you feel like it or not. Do some small act of kindness for them. Each one of us must draw up a specific plan of mortification to offer to God every day during Lent. Offer your sacrifices to Jesus through Mary for the salvation of souls. Although Lent is a season of penance, it is above all a season of hope. Just as Easter Sunday follows Good Friday, so Lent paves the way to the fulfillment of that hope which is the Resurrection. It seems simply natural that there must be sacrifice before one can experience victory. One must die to sin and to self before there can be a rebirth in Christ.
The discipline of Lent always opens the door for the bright light of Easter. The pain of Good Friday is at once the joy and triumph of the holy Cross. No passion and death, no victory. In Jesus we walk through the trials and frequent darkness of this life to the unending joy and light of Heaven. It is the Cross that wins that victory we know as Easter.
May this Lent be a time of true hope for all of us in CFC, a time of self-discipline and spiritual battle that leads to great personal triumph in Jesus Christ at Easter.
Dying He destroyed our death, rising He restored our life, come, Lord Jesus, come!
Reference: 1. Conversation with God. Vol. 2 / 1-3, Francis Fernandez
Questions for Discussion / Sharing or Personal Meditation:
1. In what ways can you practice the discipline of Lent (prayer, fasting & abstinence and good works) to show your love for God and neighbor (in your own family, in the Church, in our CFC community, and our brethren in the wider community)?
2. What are some obstacles that might be preventing you from exercising the Lenten practices recommended by the Church?
3. What good fruits have you seen manifested in your life as you practice and grow in a spirit of mortification?
Jack Macalalad CFC USA Pastoral Formation National Coordinator
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