On Feb. 14, “ValentAsh Wednesday,” this year, we began the holy season of Lent, and many of us received blessed ashes as a symbolic gesture of our repentance and of our resolve to live the 40 days of Lent to grow in virtue. In this holy season, we accompany Jesus in His 40 days of temptation in the desert. It is a time of purification and growth. It is a springtime for the soul. And it is a journey to freedom.
In our Lenten journey to Easter, we are encouraged to move from where we are to where the Lord wants us to be: to a greater obedience to God’s word, to a more fervent spirit of prayer, to a more faithful life of humility and charity; in sum, to a greater discipline that leads to a greater freedom of soul and greater love of God. As a journey, Lent is an appropriate image of our Christian life. We are moving from the moment of conception in the womb of our mothers, through our birth into the life of this world, through a new birth of baptism from God and the Mother Church, into an infinite dimension of life in God in eternal fulfillment. The journey of Christian life will not allow us to stop. We must press on, every day. We move either forward or we begin to slide backwards and deteriorate. We have to “keep on truckin’” as the old 60’s saying urged us.
Why undertake this rigorous journey to Easter? Easter – the celebration of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ - is the summit of Christian celebration and experience. It is the “Feast of feasts” because it is the day of Christ’s victory over sin and death. “The Resurrection of Jesus is the crowning truth of our faith in Christ” (CCC 638). Easter is a promise to us of our own triumph of life over the powers of death and all the enemies of man. But to share in Christ’s resurrection and come to full life, body and soul, we must rise from the death of sin and be filled with the Holy Spirit with the new life of the Risen Lord through baptism. Jesus said, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.” Jn 3:5 Baptism is our first resurrection! It is the gateway to Heaven! It is a spiritual liberation from the power of Satan and from the many sad consequences of such bondage.
“Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.” Rom 6:3-4; cf. Col 2:12. In the Catholic tradition, Lent is a time of intense preparation for baptism for new converts who will be baptized and born anew at the Easter Vigil. For those already baptized, it is a time of intense preparation for the renewal of our baptismal promises and to a renewed commitment to following Christ in a deeper way. For all who “seek that which is above”, the journey to Easter , through the grace of holy baptism, is the way to the promised land of eternal life and pure freedom.
May the Lord bless you on your journey and reveal to you the depths of His love!
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