One of the Ash Wednesday readings each year is from the Book of the Prophet Joel. From this reading, we hear, “Even now, says the LORD, return to me with your whole heart.” As we begin Lent this year, I invite you to consider those words.
The call to make a return applies to everyone, in all places and times. In each season of Lent, we prepare for Easter by looking at what Christ has done and continues to do for us. When we look at what Christ gives to each of us, we see Him give all of Himself so that we may be redeemed. Christ offers what we could never be capable of so that we might be able to enter into union with Him.
And now I am no more in the world, but they are in the world, and I am coming to thee. Holy Father, keep them in thy name, which thou hast given me, that they may be one, even as we are one. (John 17:11 RSV)
Our lives have been about striving for this union from the moment we were baptized. While the events we look at happened thousands of years ago, the graces from that ultimate gift of Christ reach us now, in the present. Lent is a time to consider how we can improve our receptivity to those graces that bring us the new life won for us.
