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
Photo by author, 08 February 2023.
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.
40 Shades of Lent by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Tuesday in the First Week of Lent, 28 February 2023
Isaiah 55:10-11 <'[[[[>< +++ ><]]]]'> Matthew 6:7-15
Photo by author, OLFU-QC, Basic Education Dept., 20 February 2023.
Praise and glory to you,
O God our loving Father!
Thank you for this wonderful
gift of Lent, of being so close
to us, consoling us in our
pains and disappointments,
assuring us of your love and
most especially of your plans
for us! Help us to be more open
to your coming, to your presence,
to your words.
Thus says the Lord: Just as from the heavens the rain and the snow come down and do not return there till they have watered the earth, making it fertile and fruitful, giving seed to the one who sows and bread to the one who eats, so shall my word be that goes forth from my mouth; it shall not return to me void, but shall do my will, achieving the end for which I sent it.
Isaiah 55:10-11
Your Son Jesus Christ taught us
to call you Father, Abba,
for indeed, you are a Father to us
who taught us how to walk
and stand and fight in this life;
as a Father, you are so loving
and caring, ready to rescue us
in times of distress; let us come
to you, call you, and to listen to you;
let us rediscover the beauty
and value of silence this Lent
so we would hear and learn
your plans for us because
there is no need for us to speak to you
as you know very well our thoughts;
what matters is that we hear
and learn your plans for us!
May we "look to you, O Lord,
so we may be radiant with joy
in the midst of our brokenness
and rise from our crushed spirits"
(Ps. 34:6, 19) in order to bring
your loving assurance
and consolation
to those burdened
and lost like us.
Amen.
Quiet Storm by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II, 27 February 2023
Lent is my favorite season in our Church calendar: partly because of my melancholic tendencies and mostly, its closeness with the realities of life, of its daily “passovers” and exodus that eventually lead to Easter. That is why for me, life is a daily lent.
This became truest to me yesterday afternoon, the First Sunday of Lent when one of our elderly priests, Msgr. Vicente “Teng” Manlapig died past 3:00 PM at the Fatima University Medical Center in Valenzuela City where I serve as chaplain.
I am still in the process of gathering the many insights and realizations I have had these past three weeks when Mons. Teng was confined with the final five days in the ICU. What is so remarkable for me which dawned upon me yesterday is the fact that Mons. Teng is the second priest I had taken cared and died in the season of Lent. The first was the late Msgr. Macario Manahan in March 16, 2014, the Second Sunday of Lent at that time.
Yes, another monsignor I took care and died in the season of Lent. I was then assigned in San Juan Apostol at Ebanghelista Parish in Bagbaguin, Sta. Maria, Bulacan when Mons Macario retired in an apartment with his adopted family in the next barrio to my parish. Like Mons. Teng, I gave him daily communion and anointing of the sick during his final stretch of about two or three weeks before death. The only difference is that Mons. Macario passed away in my presence that Sunday afternoon; I visited Mons. Teng Sunday morning before he expired in the afternoon.
I have been wondering what must be God’s message for me in making me directly involved with two elderly priests dying in the season of Lent.
It seems to me for now that Lent is the best time for us priests to die because it leads to Easter. It would be a great extra bonus perhaps for us priests to die on Easter Sunday like the Jesuit Father Teilhard de Chardin or on Divine Mercy Sunday of the Easter Octave like the great St. John Paul II or at New Year’s eve like Pope Benedict XVI recently.
In my 24 years in priesthood, I have found our life, and death, follow a certain pattern. That is another topic I intend to develop further but for the moment, here is God showing me a pattern in priestly deaths in Lent which is the season characterized by prayer, fasting, alms-giving and penance.
Thursday night, Mons. Teng he asked to me listen to his “story” which turned out to be a confession, his final one. And what a tremendous grace from God for it was a triumph against his final temptations by the devil. How wonderful that he died yesterday, the First Sunday of Lent when the gospel from Matthew was the temptations of Jesus in the wilderness. The hospital ICU is the modern wilderness of temptations where there is the macabre atmosphere of gloom and dead-seriousness, cold and lifeless with just the eerie beeps and whirring or humming of various machines accompanying patients in separate cubicles along with doctors and nurses garbed in overalls and masks like in those movie scenes of invasion by aliens or zombies.
I must confess that after witnessing another death of a senior priest this season of Lent with my ministry this past year being in the hospital, I actually feel more afraid than ever of getting old, of getting sick.
It seems to me for now
that Lent is the best time for us priests
to die because it leads to Easter.
I cannot say I am ready. No. The more I see myself afraid and so unprepared. It would be a big lie no fool would ever believe to claim I am ready to get sick and die. And even if I felt so tired and sleepy watching over Mons. Teng these past weeks, I could not pray in silence to God and ask him that he spare me those sufferings. Yes, the sense of entitlement crossed my mind many times like the thought “siguro naman, pwede na ako ma exempt, Lord” but no! I could not ask God. I feel so ashamed. It felt so bad on the taste-buds. Whenever such thoughts crossed my mind, there was always something or someone inside me preventing me from asking God for that privilege. Or grace? Because our suffering in sickness is precisely the very gift and grace of being one with Jesus Christ in the wilderness, fighting the devil’s temptations.
The gospel said it so well yesterday that after Jesus triumphed over his temptations, “the devil left him and, behold, angels came and ministered to him” (Mt.4:11). See that it was Thursday when I heard Mons. Teng’s final confession, Friday night was the last time he received the viaticum because Saturday morning he could no longer speak, could not eat that I had to consent into the insertion of an NGT for his feeding Saturday night until he slowly deteriorated Sunday morning after I had anointed him again with oil and died around the hour of the great Mercy of God at 3PM.
Photo from Mr. Nicknoc Malaluan.
The same thing is true with Mons. Macario. For about two weeks, I would rush to his apartment mostly at night and midnight to anoint him, pray for him, and give him the viaticum. Once I even celebrated Mass for a peaceful death around midnight when we thought he was about to expire which eventually came a few days after he had met and presumably reconciled with a family member. It was the Second Sunday of Lent, March 16, 2014 when he died. The gospel was the Transfiguration of Jesus. If there is anyone who would truly experience the Cross of Christ on the way to transfiguration, it is surely us, his priests.
A few years ago a friend commented to me that he thought priests were exempted from sickness and other sufferings. He could not believe that we priests get cancer, suffer stroke and other debilitating sickness. In fact, I told him that suffering is our life. One of the priests with tremendous impact on me was our formator in high school seminary, Rev. Fr. Leopoldo Nazareno we called “Fr. Naz” who spent maybe 40 years of his life with Parkinson’s disease that was so rare at that time in the 80’s.
Am I afraid of getting sick, of dying? Yes. Very much! But, what can I do? Like Jesus in the the garden of Gethsemane, even if I pray that God would take away this cup, it is still his will not mine.
Maybe for a good reason, to suffer unto death is the ultimate gift of priesthood. Even in old age for us priests, there is still the essence of victimhood, of offering. It is when out deathbed becomes our eucharistic table and altar where we finally offer ourselves to God in union with Jesus our Eternal High Priest, no longer the bread and wine because we could not celebrate the Mass nor even receive Holy Communion. It would be very sad for a priest to die not a martyr, a witness of Christ on the Cross, loved and forgiven like the “good thief”.
That is what I have seen in these two deaths of priests in the season of Lent: the immense and immeasurable mercy and love of God for us all, especially us priests. Yes, we are sinners, even more miserable than others. But, still loved and forgiven by God. May we strive more to be holy priests, thinking more of the people than ourselves. Pray for us your priests, and help us fix our eyes unto God more clearly through you, the people, the sheep of his flock. May we your priests find that life is a daily Lent, a daily passover, a daily carrying of the Cross and Crucifixion in Christ that leads to Easter. Amen.
40 Shades of Lent by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Monday in the First Week of Lent, 27 February 2023
Leviticus 19:1-2, 11-18 ><)))*> + <*(((>< Matthew 25:31-46
We hear you speaking to us,
Lord God our Father,
telling us, "Be holy,
for I, the Lord your God,
am holy" (Lev. 19: 1-2);
we hear your voice daily
right in our hearts
as we feel your nearness
to us in your gift of life,
in your love,
in your holiness
that all fill us.
But unfortunately,
left unnoticed,
unrecognized,
even denied
when we refuse
to see your face
in everyone we meet
especially the poor,
the deaf,
the blind,
the weak,
our own family
members
and neighbors.
Forgive us, Lord,
in being so exclusive
than being inclusive
like you for your holiness
encompasses us all;
teach us to love without
boundaries nor barriers,
to stop our evil ways
against one another;
let us embrace your law,
Lord, which is perfect,
refreshing the soul,
rejoicing the heart
(Ps.19:8, 9);
set our sights to
Christ's Second Coming
and judgment
which is happening now,
the acceptable time
and day of salvation;
may we love,
love,
and still love more
even those we do not
know who may be
hungry and thirsty,
a stranger or naked,
sick or in prison.
O God, how great
and loving you are
that you chose us
to be your dwelling
and most of all,
be the reflection of your
holiness despite our
many imperfections.
Amen.
Lent is the season we fix our eyes to see clearly our selves, God, and others. It is the season where the dictum is “less is more” with no flowers allowed at the altar, only plants and leaves used as decorations. Ideally, images and icons inside the church are covered during these forty days when the Gloria and the Alleluia are also omitted in the liturgy because Lent invites us to look more inside our hearts than outside to find God.
Today’s first reading reminds us the problem with our eyes that lead us to falling into sin like the first woman who was tempted by the serpent into believing that eating the forbidden fruit would open her eyes to know what is good and evil like God. See the interplay of how the fruit was pleasing to the eyes and after they have fallen into the trap of the devil, “the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized that they were naked” (cf. Gen. 3:4-7).
A big part of our temptations to sin happens in how we “see” things, literally and figuratively speaking. In the wilderness during the temptations of Jesus, the devil showed us what he often “sees” that if we follow could lead us into sin. Let us see what Jesus “saw” during those moments of temptations and triumphed over evil.
Detail of mosaic “Temptations of Christ” at St. Mark Basilica, Venice, Italy. Photo from psephizo.com.
At that time Jesus was led by the Spirit into the desert to be tempted by the devil. He fasted for forty days and forty nights, and afterwards he was hungry. The tempter approached and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, command that these stones become loaves of bread.” He said in reply, “It is written: One does not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes forth from the mouth of God.”
Matthew 4:1-4
First temptation of the devil is for us to see scarcity, to see nothing, to see too little, to see there are not enough that the tendency is for us to hoard and be selfish. But Jesus tells us today even in the barrenness of the wilderness where there was no food nor water, there is always plenty and abundance when we see God.
When we were in elementary school, we were told how food and water would run out in the future with worldwide hunger and thirst happening in apocalyptic proportions. It had never happened. Yes, our natural resources are depleting not because of our normal consumption but largely because of human greed. We see everything so few, not enough for everyone that our tendency is to get more, driving prices up with the poor left to fend for themselves of whatever is left behind.
What we see more is what we do not have, not seeing the beautiful and precious ones we have like family and friends, health and life itself as well as faith in God. There is always the temptation most especially in the midst of difficulties and trials to see everything as ugly and dismal like the first parents after the fall when “they realized they were naked” whereas before, “they felt no shame” because they were good.
Observe how the eyes and the mind are closely intertwined, of how wrong judgments result when our eyes are deceived by what we see or do not see. Look inside your heart when you feel like alone and abandoned or when in the wilderness of sickness and sufferings. See God in everything even in nothingness by reading and praying his words in the Sacred Scriptures and you shall find life and abundance.
Then the devil took him to the holy city, and made him stand on the parapet of the temple, and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down. For it is written: He will command his angels concerning you and with their hands they will support you, lest you dash your foot against a stone.” Jesus answered him, “Again it is written, “You shall not put the Lord, your God, to the test.”
Matthew 4:5-7
Second temptation is when see more of power and entitlement that lead us to becoming like gods.
See the deception of the devil as he brought Jesus to the temple, the house of his Father, making him stand on the parapet to test his obedience and submission to God. It continues to happen to us these days, especially for us priests and bishops, those inside the church like its volunteers and servants, or those who see themselves as devout and pious Catholics who feel entitled here on earth and even in heaven!
No one, not even Jesus Christ claimed any entitlement for being the Son of God. In fact, in his being the Christ, he taught us the importance of submission and obedience always to the will of God our Father.
The first sin was not just pride and disobedience of Adam and Eve. It was a sin rooted in the heart, of feeling so special in paradise, daring to be like God. A feeling of entitlement, of manipulation and control to play like God.
The second temptation of Christ reminds us all supposed to be close to God, his servants to always look and examine our hearts if it is truly God whom we love and follow or just rules and commandments, rites and rituals that we forget the people we are supposed to lovingly serve and care for.
The sad reality in our church is how the devil’s temptation of Jesus is realized among us priests who are being served wrongly, even adored and worshipped by the many people so deceived of the temptation to get close to clergymen or the church. This is the reason why the poor and sufferings are still marginalized because they have remained outside our reach as we all tend to see ourselves being protected by the angels in our positions of power.
Let us all get down from our ivory towers of power, of pride and entitlement especially in the church to begin seeing the poor people on the ground and stop testing God if he would work miracles on them lest we have forgotten we are his arms and limbs.
Then the devil took him up to a very high mountain, and showed him all the kingdoms of the world in their magnificence, and he said to him, “All these I shall give to you, if you will prostrate yourself and worship me.” At this, Jesus said to him, “Get away, Satan! It is written: The Lord, your God, shall you worship and him alone shall you serve.”
Matthew 4:8-10
Third temptation is clearly idolatry, of self-worship, of vanity. See how Jesus told Satan to get away after this third temptation because this is the most insidious as far as Matthew is concerned (in Luke’s version, this is the second temptation).
This third temptation is also very surreptitious which Al Pacino as the devil described in “The Devil’s Advocate” opposite Keanu Reeves as “my most favorite sin.”
We may not be kneeling before strange gods and idols but as Simon & Garfunkel sang in the “Sound of Silence”, so many of us “bowed and prayed on the neon gods we made” with our obsession with signature and expensive things and gadgets, whether original or fake.
It is also the temptation of being famous with our obsession not only with all the beauty augmentations readily available and the fitness craze of some who practically live inside gyms but also with too much living in social media where some have gone crazy counting the likes and reactions they receive in their posts.
See how Jesus won against Satan in all his temptations including in this final one because his focus was on God alone. Jesus is telling us this Sunday as we embark on our Lenten journey to remain in God above all.
Our eyes can be easily deceived because they cannot see everything at one instance. It takes times for us to recognize what or who we are looking at. There are times we need to use instruments to see everything clearly like telescopes and microscopes.
Most of all, what we see may not even be true at all. That is why we have to close our eyes in order to see better, to experience better and understand better like when we are deeply in pain and sorrow or in ecstasy and bursting with joy.
How sad that when Adam and Eve sinned and their eyes were opened, they hid themselves and sewed figs to cover themselves. Today, people go out into the open, even taking pride and not troubled at all in filming or recording and uploading sinful scenes in their lives. And everyone is so glad to take a look on them without realizing how it could lead them into shame like Adam Eve.
Let us heed St. Paul’s invitation in the second reading to live in Jesus so we may show our new humanity in Christ, we who are so loved and forgiven by God and restored to grace. Let us fix our eyes on Jesus alone to fight temptations for we are no longer slaves to our passions and desires like Adam (Rom. 5:12, 17-19). Amen. Have a blessed first week in Lent!
40 Shades of Lent by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Friday after Ash Wednesday, 24 February 2023
Isaiah 58:1-9 ><}}}}*> + <*{{{{>< Matthew 9:14-15
Photo by author, Dead Sea oasis, Israel, 2017.
Forgive us, O God, merciful Father, for refusing to grow up, for refusing to mature in your Son Jesus Christ in loving you, serving you, relating with you. Until now, O God, we choose to act immaturely, believing in ourselves as if we know everything very well, even bragging to you of our goodness and holiness; like the people in the time of Isaiah, we are so proud, "seeking you day after day, desiring to know your ways, like a nation that has done what is just and not abandoned your law, O God, even asking you to declare what is due to us, pleased to gain access to you, God" (cf. Is. 58:2).
Lo, on your fast day you carry out your own pursuits, and drive all your laborers. Yes, your fast ends i quarreling and fighting, striking with wicked claw… This, rather, is the fasting that I wish… then you shall call, and the Lord will answer, you shall cry for help, and he will say: Here I am!
Isaiah 58:3b-4, 6, 9
Until now,
we do not fast
and we refuse to fast,
citing so many reasons
and alibis because
until now we have not
learned the essence
and importance of fasting;
help us grow,
help us mature in Christ!
Let us realize the essence
of fasting is creating a space
within us for you, O God,
through others whom we
lovingly serve in your name
to make you present among us
so that when we call, we hear
you say "Here I am!"
Help us grow deeper
in you, O God, in Jesus
who had come to us so
that our spirit of fasting
may come forth from within
us, not from outside that
make us focus more on what
to avoid; it is not the thing
outside that fasting is concerned
but of what is inside us
we are willing to surrender,
to forego, to give up
in order to have you
present among the least
and neglected. Amen.
40 Shades of Lent by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Thursday after Ash Wednesday, 23 February 2023
Deuteronomy 30:15-20 ><000'> + ><000'> + ><000'> Luke 9:22-25
Everyday you bless us,
O God, with that great power
to choose freely what we desire
best for us; but, many times, we make
the wrong choices that often lead us
to more pains and emptiness,
sadness and that feeling of being
lost.
Most of all,
we choose sin,
we choose evil,
than choosing good,
than choosing you, O God.
Moses said to the people: “I call heaven and earth today to witness against you: I have set before you life and death, the blessing and the curse. Choose life, then, that you and your descendants may live, by loving the Lord, your God, heeding his voice, and holding fast to him. For that will mean life for you, a long life for you to live on the land that the Lord swore he would give to your fathers Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.”
Deuteronomy 30:19-20
So many times
we make the wrong choices
when we insist on what we like
without really knowing what it is;
we make wrong choices
when we choose to disregard
you and your ways, Lord;
worst, we make the wrong choices
because we reject our very selves!
What a tragedy
when we ourselves refuse
to believe in ourselves,
in our worth,
in our possibilities
because we have lost all hope
in life, in you, and in others
due to failures or disappointments
or frustrations in life;
we choose wrongly when we
avoid pains and sufferings,
when we refuse to choose
the Cross not realizing
it is the one that truly leads
to life and prosperity
because every suffering,
every pain
leads to maturity
that make us better
and more open to
life and prosperity.
These 40 days of Lent,
let us choose you, Jesus
including your Cross;
let us choose people and
things outside of ourselves
because you have chosen to
care us and all our needs;
let us trust you
so we may always choose you
because the times we choose
wrongly in life,
when we choose people
and things that are seemingly
favorable to us,
that is when
we do doubt you,
when we do not
trust you.
Amen.
Jesus,
King of Mercy,
we trust in you!
Lawiswis ng Salita ni P. Nicanor F. Lalog II, Ika-22 ng Pebrero 2023
Larawan mula sa Google.com.
Paloob ang Kuwaresma
hindi palabas.
Katulad nitong ating buhay
na papaloob at hindi palabas.
Pagmasdan mga tanda
at kilos nitong panahon
habang Panginoon ang tinutunton
hinuhubad ating kapalaluan
upang bihisan ng kababaan,
sinasaid ating kalabisan
upang punan ng Kanyang
buhay at kabanalan.
Paloob ang Kuwaresma,
hindi palabas.
Simula ay Miercules de Ceniza
mga noo'y pinapahiran ng
abong binasbasan
paalala ng kamatayan
tungo sa buhay na walang-hanggan
kaya kinakailangan
taos-pusong pag-amin
at pagsuko ng mga kasalanan
talikuran at labanan
gawi ng kasamaan.
Paloob ang Kuwaresma
hindi palabas.
Huwag magpapansin
tuwing mananalangin
hayaan saloobin at hiling
isalamin ng buhay natin;
pag-aayuno ay higit pa sa
di pagkain ng karne
kungdi mawalan ng laman
ating tiyan, magkapuwang
sa Diyos at sino mang
nagugutom at nahihirapan;
ano mang kaluguran ating
maipagpaliban ay ilalaan
sa nangangailangan
buong katahimikan maglimos
tanda ng kaisahan
kay Hesus nasa mukha
ng mga dukha
at kapus-palad.
Paloob ang Kuwaresma
hindi palabas.
Sa gitna nitong panahon
ng social media na lahat
ay ipinakikita at ibig makita,
lahat ay pabongga
puro palabas;
ipinapaalala ng Kuwaresma
ang mga pinakamahalaga
pinakamaganda
at makabuluhan
ay hindi nakikita
nitong mga mata
bagkus ay nadarama
dahil sa paningin ng Diyos
ang tunay na mahalaga
ay yaong natatago,
napapaloob katulad Niya
na nananahan
sa ating puso at kalooban.
40 Shades of Lent by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Ash Wednesday, 22 February 2023
Joel 2:12-18 ><))))*> 2 Corinthians 5:20-6:2 ><))))*> Matthew 6:1-6, 16-18
Our opening antiphon
of today's celebration of
Ash Wednesday gives hint
of the joyful tone of our Lenten journey:
"You are merciful to all, O Lord,
and despise nothing that you have made.
You overlook people's sins,
to bring them to repentance,
and you spare them,
for you are the Lord our God."
Amid the shades of violet to signify our confession of sin and movement of repentance is also a profession of our faith in your love, kindness and mercy, O God our Father! The joy of Lent is YOU, O God our loving Father who lavishes us with mercy in Christ Jesus.
Thank you for calling us to enter into this holy season of Lent; let us not forget that YOU are the center and focus of this journey, never us despite the good works we all have to do like praying, fasting and alms-giving; YOU are the one whom we must please, not people so they may return to you; YOU are not appeased by what we offer and do; in fact, we are able to come to you because you are "gracious and merciful" - we have come to know you by your concrete actions of love and mercy, kindness and tenderness.
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.
Joel 2:12-13
Rend our closed hearts, O Lord;
tear apart the hard coverings of
bitterness and rejection,
doubts and mistrust
so we may open ourselves
to your coming in Christ Jesus;
strengthen our hearts so we may
come back to you in genuine conversion,
to be reconciled to you, O God,
for "now is a very acceptable time,
the day of salvation" (2 Cor. 5:20,
6:2).
Grant us the right attitude of heart,
take away our vanities and hypocrisies
that neither deceive you nor fool people;
let us get inside ourselves to meet you
right inside us where you dwell,
waiting for us
to console us,
to refresh us,
to comfort us.
Amen.
The Lord Is My Chef Daily Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Tuesday in the Seventh Week of Ordinary Time, Year I, 21 February 2023
Sirach 2:1-11 ><0000'> + ><0000'> + ><0000'> Mark 9:30-37
Photo by author, 09 February 2023.
On this final day
of Ordinary Time
as we begin tomorrow
our Lenten journey into
Easter, we pray to you,
God our loving Father,
to give us the grace to stay
committed to you in your Son
Jesus Christ.
In this journey of life
which is characterized by the
40 days of Lent,
let us be focused on the words
and teachings, and life of your Son
Jesus Christ.
Let us stay committed in him,
in you like a child to his father.
They came to Capernaum and, once inside the house, he began to ask them, “What were you arguing about on the way?” But they remained silent. They had been discussing among themselves on the way who was the greatest.
Mark 9:33-34
Like the psalmist today,
we pray that we may commit
our lives to you, Lord;
let us heed the teachings of
Ben Sirach to "prepare ourselves
for trials" by being "sincere of heart
and steadfast, listening to your words"
and most especially, to "wait on God
with patience, cling to him, forsake him not"
(Sirach 2:1-2, 3).
May we truly prepare ourselves
this day internally for tomorrow's
Ash Wednesday so that we may
focus more on God than on ourselves
and on the externalities of the
rich rituals of Lent
meant to touch our hearts
and soul in order to find
you in our brothers and
sisters.
Let that be our commitment
to you today
and always.
Amen.
lordmychef.com 