1st Sunday of Lent 2023

Jesus Meek and Humble of Heart, make our hearts like unto Thine.

What is the point of lent?

Lent is a time the Church gives us to renew our determination in the spiritual battle for the salvation of our souls. By renouncing certain pleasure in our life and making use of penance we renew our efforts in following Christ, as we read in Scripture: “Then Jesus told His disciples, “If anyone wants to come after Me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow Me.” And so our lent penances become, in a small way, an imitation of Christ. Like Christ we try to reject the dominion of the world, the flesh and the devil who are trying to have power over us. Like Christ we say with our Lenten penances, "Get away, Satan! It is written: 'The Lord, your God, shall you worship and him alone shall you serve.'"

Lent is a time where we join Our Lord in His suffering, following first into the desert then into His Passion so that we may share in His victory over death and His Eternal Glory. Christ has sanctified our fasting and penances with His own fasting and penances. Though we call ourselves Christians we can at times be drawn away from Christ. Sometimes we allow evil spirits to draw us away from God. The spirits of: lust, envy, greed, wrath, pride, sloth, vanity, gluttony and all things selfish. The more we allow these spirits to lead us into sin the further away from God we go and the more like them we become. The more we allow these spirits to dwell in us, in our thoughts or desires, the harder it becomes to free ourselves from them. And that is why we need Christ, Who is the Way the Truth and the Life. He who has the power to reject and cast out the evil spirits.

Following Christ

The Holy Spirit, which led Christ into the wilderness, is leading us to Him, who we will find there in the quiet of the wilderness of prayer and contemplation.

As Christians we say: I will follow you wherever you go; if you pass through fire I will not be torn away from you, nor will I fear evil, for you are with me. You bear my griefs and you grieve over me; you go first through the narrow door of the passion to prepare a broad [place and] entrance for those who follow. As St Paul says, “Who will separate us from the love of Christ?”

Should not all Christians, then, share in Christ’s fast? If we receive good from Him, why should we not endure the bad? Don’t we say that we will follow Him wherever He will go? All that He suffered, He suffered for us, will we be put off by the cross Christ offers us for our own salvation? Surely it is no great thing for the one who is to sit with Christ at the Father’s table to fast with Him here in the desert. Surely it is no great thing for us to suffer with Him now so that with Him we will be glorified! Happy is the person who clings to Christ through everything, and follows Him wherever he goes!

This lent let us try to follow the Holy Spirit's movements in our soul. The world, the flesh and the devil will try to lead us astray. With our penance, prayer and alms-giving we will suffer with Christ and resist the evil spirit’s influence and learn from the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit teaches us to be: pure, chaste and temperament; kind, loving and charitable; Diligent; Patient and merciful, humble and modest.