40 Shades of Lent by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Wednesday in the First Week of Lent, 01 March 2023
Jonah 3:1-10   <*{{{{>< +++ ><}}}}*>   Luke 11:29-31

O loving Father,
teach us to believe again
during this blessed season of Lent;
help us rediscover our faith
to believe in you again amid our many
sins and guilt feelings;
help us to believe again in people
after so many betrayals by friends and family;
most of all, help us to believe again
in ourselves despite our failures
and weaknesses.

So many times we are like your
prophet Jonah, 
so reluctant in answering your calls,
so stubborn and hardheaded in our
biases and prejudices against others,
many times we resort to pessimism
and cynicism with how life in the world
is going, feeling lost and hopeless.

So Jonah made ready and went to Nineveh, according to the Lord’s bidding. Now Nineveh was an enormously large city; it took three days to go through it. Jonah began his journey through the city, and had gone but a single day’s walk announcing, “Forty days more and Nineveh shall be destroyed,” when the people of Nineveh believed God; they proclaimed a fast and all of them, great and small, put on sackcloth.

Jonah 3:3-5

Help us in our unbelief, Lord!
Help us stop asking for many signs
except Jesus Christ present to us
in the Sacraments especially
the Eucharist and Confession
we often receive these days.
Help us to simply believe
and obey your words
like Jonah at Nineveh.
Amen.