Thursday after Ash Wednesday
In so many ways, the beginning the season of lent is all about new beginnings. One could approach it from any number of directions such as the liturgy, or personal and family experience, or the dynamics of waiting and growth. Any or all of these approaches would eventually take a person to the reality of the need to choose and to change. “Choose and change” became the only viable option for the people listening to Moses in the first reading from Deuteronomy: choosing and changing to obey the law set before them and recognizing the gift of God being offered to them a powerful fruitful relationship with God. That is what it meant to choose life. It meant turning away from temporary and cheap foundations and build on the solid foundation of their ancestors.
But choose and change comes with a cost. Making that choice for the good automatically invites the experience of conflict and resistance with the power of evil. This is the clear and consistent teaching of Jesus. He presents this not as general principle of the conflict of good and evil, but he personalizes the choice. If you choose to follow him, in a committed way, it means rejecting the false values and ways of the world and asking forgiveness for our own sins. Yes, we should expect to suffer. The season of lent reminds us that our voluntary self-denial, fasting, and outreach to others forces us to place a redeeming meaning and purpose in the experience of suffering.
Reflection by Fr. Daniel Petsche, OSB
Posted in Articles for Lent, Daily Reflections