By Tom Thomas.
It is amazing how the seasons change, almost like clockwork. As I pen these lines, the pleasant, cool wintry days in my city have given way to blazing hot, sunshine-filled days. The mercury level seems to rise by the day, though it is still pleasantly cool in the early mornings and late evenings. This comfort will disappear soon. Just like the changing seasons, the Catholic Church also changes from the Season of Advent to the Ordinary time and soon to the Season of Lent.
It is always a struggle to shake off the excesses of the Christmas New Year Advent season and face the 40 days of Lent—40 days in the desert—where one gives up what one likes voluntarily to hear God and discern His Will. At the beginning of the season, it is wonderful to read the Holy Father Pope Francis’ address for Lent 2024. It helps me prepare for the arduous trek ahead. The Holy Father says, “Lent is the season of grace in which the desert can become once more—in the words of the prophet Hosea—the place of our first love (cf. Hos 2:16-17). God shapes his people; he enables us to leave our slavery behind and experience a Passover from death to life. Like a bridegroom, the Lord draws us once more to himself, whispering words of love to our hearts.
The exodus from slavery to freedom is no abstract journey. If our celebration of Lent is to be concrete, the first step is to desire to open our eyes to reality. When the Lord calls out to Moses from the burning bush, he immediately shows that he is a God who sees and, above all, hears: “I have observed the misery of my people who are in Egypt; I have heard their cry on account of their taskmasters. Indeed, I know their sufferings, and I have come down to deliver them from the Egyptians and to bring them up out of that land to a good and broad land, a land flowing with milk and honey” (Ex 3:7-8). Today too, the cry of so many of our oppressed brothers and sisters rises to heaven. Let us ask ourselves: Do we hear that cry? Does it trouble us? Does it move us? All too many things keep us apart from each other, denying the fraternity that, from the beginning, binds us to one another.”
These words provoke me. I have not looked up from my iPhone to heed the knocks on the window of my car, stopped at a red traffic light, of the one crying for alms. I have judged him or her as someone who wants to extort instead of helping in whatever little way I can. Those at the entrance to the Church, begging for alms, I do not spare even a thought for, as I speed off after attending daily Mass. What have I become? How can I change for the better?
The Holy Father says, “…I asked two questions, which have become more and more pressing: “Where are you?” (Gen 3:9) and “Where is your brother?” (Gen 4:9). Our Lenten journey will be concrete if, by listening once more to those two questions, we realize that even today we remain under the rule of Pharaoh. A rule that makes us weary and indifferent. A model of growth that divides and robs us of a future. Earth, air and water are polluted, but so are our souls. True, Baptism has begun our process of liberation, yet there remains in us an inexplicable longing for slavery. A kind of attraction to the security of familiar things, to the detriment of our freedom.”
Again, these words convict me. I have eaten from the fruit of the tree of materialism and consumerism. This puts me in the wrong place, somewhere where I cannot even identify that the person standing before me is my brother or sister. I need to get out of this place.
The Holy Father says all is not lost. “God has not grown weary of us. Let us welcome Lent as the great season in which he reminds us: “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery” (Ex 20:2). Lent is a season of conversion, a time of freedom. Jesus himself, as we recall each year on the first Sunday of Lent, was driven into the desert by the Spirit in order to be tempted in freedom. For forty days, he will stand before us and with us: the incarnate Son. Unlike Pharaoh, God does not want subjects, but sons and daughters. The desert is the place where our freedom can mature in a personal decision not to fall back into slavery. In Lent, we find new criteria of justice and a community with which we can press forward on a road not yet taken.”
The path towards conversion, however, is not something easily achieved. The Holy Father goes on to add that this conversion “entails a struggle, as the book of Exodus and the temptations of Jesus in the desert make clear to us. The voice of God, who says, “You are my Son, the Beloved” (Mk 1:11), and “You shall have no other gods before me” (Ex 20:3) is opposed by the enemy and his lies. Even more to be feared than Pharaoh are the idols that we set up for ourselves; we can consider them as his voice speaking within us. To be all-powerful, to be looked up to by all, to domineer over others—every human being is aware of how deeply seductive that lie can be. It is a road well-travelled. We can become attached to money, to certain projects, ideas, or goals, to our position, to a tradition, or even to certain individuals. Instead of making us move forward, they paralyse us. Instead of encountering each other, they create conflict. Yet there is also a new humanity, a people of the little ones and of the humble who have not yielded to the allure of the lie. Whereas those who serve idols become like them, mute, blind, deaf, and immobile (cf. Ps 114:4), the poor of spirit are open and ready: a silent force of good that heals and sustains the world.”
Embracing the road less travelled seems to be the way to conversion. Today, I find that it seems that one does not want to struggle and just enjoys the status quo. Why give up what I like for Lent when other Catholics around me are not doing so? It is difficult to be the odd person out, so the mind says sometimes, why bother? Why not just enjoy the days without giving up anything at all in Lent? And yet, as I read from the Holy Father’s message, I infer that struggle is a must if I want to regain my Christian identity and mission.
I treasure the words that follow from the Holy Father. “It is time to act, and in Lent, to act also means to pause. To pause in prayer, in order to receive the word of God, to pause like the Samaritan in the presence of a wounded brother or sister. Love of God and love of neighbour are one love. Not to have other gods is to pause in the presence of God beside the flesh of our neighbour. For this reason, prayer, almsgiving and fasting are not three unrelated acts, but a single movement of openness and self-emptying in which we cast out the idols that weigh us down, the attachments that imprison us. Then the atrophied and isolated heart will revive. Slow down, then, and pause! The contemplative dimension of life that Lent helps us to rediscover will release new energies. In the presence of God, we become brothers and sisters, more sensitive to one another: in place of threats and enemies, we discover companions and fellow travellers. This is God’s dream, the promised land to which we journey once we have left our slavery behind.”
Yes, this is what I must do this Lent to regain my Christian alignment. It becomes so clear now.
Pause.
“No act of virtue can be great if it is not followed by advantage for others. So, no matter how much time you spend fasting, no matter how much you sleep on a hard floor and eat ashes and sigh continually, if you do no good to others, you do nothing great.” — John Chrysostom