Quinquagesima Sunday, February 19, 2012
Luke 18:31-43
Nearing the end of His life, Jesus tells His Apostles again that He is about to die. But even after three years with Jesus they are still worldly; they still expect a powerful Messiah who will restore Israel to its former glory. That’s why the Gospel says “they understood not the things that were said.” But our Lord told them this to strengthen their belief in Him, so when they saw him later in His Passion, naked, beaten and bloody, spat upon, insulted and crucified they would not be led astray.
The Season of Lent starts this Wednesday and this is the time for us to prepare for our Lord’s Passion so that we are not led astray by the temptations of the world. The Apostles saw the world triumph over the Son of God, but the world is a fool and always will be. On Pentecost, fifty days after His Resurrection, the scales left the eyes of the Apostles and the fog left their minds. They understood then everything Jesus had told them. They saw what the humiliating death of Jesus meant, the triumph of God and the salvation of mankind.
The forty-day fast we are about to enter on was not practiced, as far as is known, in the time of the Apostles. They celebrated the Resurrection of the Lord every Sunday. Later there was a very severe seven-day fast before Easter Sunday. And still later it developed into the forty days of Lent that we know today with its fasting and abstinence. Lent prepares our souls for Heaven by reminding us that the pleasures of the world are not as desirable as Eternity with God.
Every day our minds are filled with the things of this life – jobs, money, cars, family, entertainment, and there is a place for all these things. But Lent is the place and the time for thinking about how we will spend our lives in eternity. Lent is the time to think about God’s gifts to us. Think way back to Abraham, about 4,000 years ago. He marks the beginning of the religion of the Old Testament. God wanted to know if there was a man who loved Him so much that he would be willing to offer his son as a sacrifice to God. Abraham was willing, but of course God didn’t permit it. Abraham raised his arm with knife in hand and an angel stopped him. God tested Abraham and knew that he loved Him. Now think forward 2,000 years from Abraham to the time of Jesus Christ. God sent His Son to us to be the sacrifice of propitiation, or conciliation, for the sins of all of us, beginning with the sin of disobedience of Adam and Eve.
But before we go forward to the time of Jesus, first think back in time to Adam and Eve. How serious was their sin of disobedience? It was extremely serious because the punishment for that sin was death. Adam and Eve weren’t only thrown out of the Garden of Eden. Before their sin they and all of us were meant to live forever in a bountiful universe and to walk and talk with God. Once humanity sinned, humanity was changed. We developed a liking for sin in all its forms, and if we ever wanted to walk and talk with God again, we had to earn our way back to that. The Son of God, Who is the Way, the Truth and the Life, has given us that way back to God through His Passion, Death and Resurrection.
The Passion of Christ was not stopped by an angel as Abraham was stopped. It played out till the end on the Cross. But by His death Jesus gives us hope, because on the third day He rose from the dead, and that is the promise given to all of us, that when Christ comes again there will be a general resurrection of all who have lived on earth. Some are destined for Heaven. Others will have earned eternity in Hell by living a life of sin.
In addition to fasting we prepare for Good Friday, the day He died, and Easter Sunday, the day He rose from the dead, by meditating on His Passion. St. Bonaventure wrote that “nothing produces in the soul such a complete sanctification” as contemplating the Passion of our Lord. Read the four Gospels on His Passion, Death and Resurrection to see exactly what He went through for us. St. Paul must have spent a lot of time contemplating our Lord’s Passion because he said he did not come in loftiness of speech, “For I judged not myself to know anything . . . but Jesus Christ, and him crucified.” (1 Cor. 2:2) +++
Ash Wednesday, February 22, 2012
There will be a Mass and distribution of ashes that day at 7:00 p.m. at Pwned Cyber Cantina, 800 E. Strawbridge, Melbourne, FL
YOUR OBLIGATIONS DURING LENT
FAST: Everyone between ages of 21 & 59. You may eat only one full meal with meat. You may also eat two light meals, without meat. These two meals together must not equal the main meal. Water and juices may be taken between meals.
ABSTINENCE: No meat on Ash Wednesday, on all Fridays, on Ember Days (Feb 29, Mar 2, Mar 3) and on Holy Saturday (Apr 7).
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