Preparing for Lent

In just a few days, we will begin the annual discipline of Lent: the period of forty days that is given to us each year so that we can prepare our hearts for the great celebration of Easter.  I will speak more about how we can prepare for this celebration when Ash Wednesday arrives, but even now, I think we can all begin to think about what our experience of Lent might be.

In the gospel that we have heard today, Jesus asks some questions that might help us to orient ourselves and to prepare our hearts.  He asks his disciples some interesting questions - which appear to be rhetorical, but questions that probably led them to reflect on their own situations.  These same questions can also help us to do the same.

Can a blind person guide a blind person?  Will not both fall into a pit? (Lk 6:39)  Our lives of faith are a constant journey that begins at baptism; a journey that will not end until we are reunited with our Father in heaven.  Along the way, our God is always near to us, but it is up to us to follow his guidance.  Unfortunately, at times, we choose to follow the guidance of others, and sometimes the others that we choose to follow can become lost themselves.  Have we fallen into this trap?  If we have, Lent may give us a chance to start again, to focus on Jesus and to follow him because he knows the way that we should travel so that we can find our way home to our loving God.

Why do you see the speck in your neighbour's eye, but do not notice the log in your own eye? (Lk 6:41)  Human beings seem to have an uncanny ability to recognize the faults of others, but at the same time, we also seem to blind to our own faults.  Is this because deep within our hearts, we may be aware of our own weakness but we don't want to admit it to anyone - even to ourselves - in case we might be perceived as weak in the eyes of others?  Perhaps we think that the admission of guilt will somehow make us less in the eyes of God, or in the eyes of others?  Yet, if we were the parent who was seeking to console a child who had done something wrong, would we not immediately want to speak reassuring words, to tell our precious child: There is nothing that you could ever do that would make me love you less than I do right now?  Perhaps as Lent begins, we can ask for this grace, and perhaps if we can hear these words addressed to us, we would be more willing to be merciful with others.

Dear friends, it is not too late for us to change our hearts.  Metanoia - the changing of hearts - is the grace that we are invited to experience during the liturgical season of Lent.  Since the day of our baptism, God has been at work within us, planting the seeds of goodness, mercy, forgiveness and love and helping us to recognize these seeds within us as they continue to grow and to bear fruit (cf Lk 6:43), and all of this is in preparation for the day when these mortal bodies of ours will put on immortality (cf 1 Cor 15:54).

Let us prepare our hearts in the coming days so that we will be able to set out on the journey of Lent, together with the Lord who never leaves us alone.  He will guide us every step of the way until we reach our eternal home, until we celebrate the great joy of the resurrection that is the gift of Easter.