Feb. 17, 2021: Ash Wednesday

Feb. 17, 2021: Ash Wednesday

If we were asked to go on a long-term trip away from our home, we would likely pack a lot of clothes, toiletries, electronics, and convenience items. The temptation is to overpack so that we will have everything we need for all climates and situations. However, the consequence of overpacking is that we burden ourselves to the point that we’re unable to respond and adjust to unexpected challenges. The next 40 days of Lent is a journey to bring us to a deeper love of God. Jesus teaches us the essentials of life that we truly need and gives us the freedom to part with our wants and temptations that ultimately weigh us down. 

As we prepare for this 40 days journey, it will be helpful for us to ponder these three questions:

Do we know how to pray and why we pray?
Do we know how to fast and why we fast?
Do we know how to give alms and why we give alms?

A priest succinctly summarized why we pray, fast, and give alms during the season of Lent. He said, the purpose of these disciplines is for us to make a real conversion and return our hearts to God the Father. We have turned away from the Father by putting other gods ahead of him and by squandering the grace that He has placed in our lives through baptism and the Holy Eucharist. When we fast, we sacrifice our love of “self” so that we can become free to love God and others. When we pray, we sacrifice our love of time in order to make time to be in the presence of God and listen. When we give alms, we sacrifice our love of “stuff” in order to support our brothers and sisters in need. 

Listen again to the powerful words of Prophet Joel:

“Even now, says the LORD, return to me with your whole heart, with fasting, and weeping, and mourning; Rend your hearts, not your garments, and return to the LORD, your God. For gracious and merciful is he, slow to anger, rich in kindness, and relenting in punishment.”

Let the ashes we receive today remind us that we are given a very short time on this earth and that our bodies will become dust when we are buried. God has given us an eternal soul, made in His image and likeness. Like a lump of clay in the potter’s hand, we ask God to reshape and re-mold our eternal soul to ready us for heaven and the grace to renounce our sins and to turn away from temptations of the devil. 

Our Lord promised, “He who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I will love him and manifest myself to him” (Jn 14:21). This 40 day journey will be sustained by God’s love. We are to do our part in spiritual commitment to prayer, fasting, and almsgiving.

God of mercy and compassion

Look with pity upon me

Father, let me call thee Father

Tis thy child returns to thee.

Refrain

Jesus Lord, I ask for mercy

Let me not implore in vain

All my sins I now detest them

Never will I sin again.

By my sins I have deserved

Death and endless misery

Hell with all its pains and torments

And for all eternity.

By my sins I have abandoned

Right and claim to heaven above

Where the saints rejoice forever

In a boundless sea of love.

See our Saviour, bleeding, dying

On the cross of Calvary

To that cross my sins have nail'd him

Yet he bleeds and dies for me.