Making Things Right…Again
Come now, let us set things right,
Says the LORD:
Though your sins be like scarlet,
They may become white as snow;
Thought they be crimson red,
They may become white as wool. †Isaiah 1: 18
When I was six, and my brother was about three, we decided it would be a good idea to shake a sealed two-liter bottle of soda and see what happened when you unscrewed the top.
I don’t think I need to tell you what happened.
We also thought it would be a good idea to do this on the same day that my mother had just washed the floor.
(The mothers in the audience are groaning right now, I know.)
As soon as we uncapped the bottle and the liquid starting flowing out onto the table and the floor, we knew we were going to be busted. And we were. Punishment was fast and furious.
I imagine that, to God, most of us are like my brother and I with the Sprite bottle. We do some pretty stupid things out of spiritual immaturity or ignorance, or even misplaced curiosity. (See: Eve, serpent, garden, fruit.) The Apostles did some stupid things—probably a lot of stupid things that didn’t make it into the Gospels. So we’re in good company with our mistakes.
But during Lent, we were called to “set things right”. God invited us to fix the things that have gone wrong. Because things go wrong; so wrong that God sent His only son to save us from our sins.
He is Risen!
Truly He is Risen!
In Advent, the same theme is expressed—God came to Earth as an infant to save us. Because we needed to be saved. And in Lent, that baby boy is grown, and heading to the cross. We have been redeemed, because Jesus died on the cross and rose again on the first Easter. But still, we need to set things right.
Now, my brother and I didn’t mop the floor for our mother. At six and three, we probably wouldn’t have done a very good job. But we were punished for what we did wrong. And while we did many other things wrong as we were growing up, we never made that particular mistake again.
God doesn’t expect us to become instantly perfect. We fall, a lot. We fall repeatedly. To get back up, spiritually, requires confession, which I’ve already written about, Always Fresh.
During Lent, we should have pondered penance more deeply, more prayerfully. The three parts of Lent—prayer, fasting, almsgiving—help us “clean the floor”, so to speak. They cleanse our souls of what is not God and help us set things right with ourselves, the world at large, and with God. We were called to enter more deeply into ourselves and see what needed to be set right within us.
Lent doesn’t always go as planned, and it can be hard to do this work for forty days. The messiness of life creeps in, and we can forget “prayer, fasting, almsgiving.” No matter what God gave you this Lent, let us continue to go deeply into ourselves, pondering what we do, and why we do it—continue to go to confession, to fast more deeply on Fridays. Taking even a moment to steal into our interior deserts and beginning to set things right is better than nothing. It’s sort of like cleaning: even if you don’t have time to do everything, you can pick up the socks, put the used glasses in the dishwasher, and pull the stuffed rabbit off the top of the lamp before it catches on fire. It’s not a lot. But it’s a start, or a continuation.
See You Easter Monday
We’ll see you Easter Monday with a beautiful giveaway in honor of and inspired by the birth of Jenny’s new little boy…think blue.
Make it a Holy Week…
{Image from Fisheaters}
The Spirit of Mortification
I came across a wonderful meditation from Divine Intimacy
In discussing the true spirit of mortification, Fr. Gabriel states that it embraces all occasions for physical and moral suffering permitted by Divine Providence. These sufferings may include illness or fatigue, the effort involved in performing our daily duties, intense labor, defects of mind, or poverty. If we desire to surrender to God’s will in everything, we will not try to lighten these sufferings or run from them. It is these that God wants us to accept from His hands…more than any voluntary mortification that we choose of our own accord.
“All…must have that truly deep spirit of mortification which can embrace with generosity every opportunity for renunciation prepared or permitted by God.”
The same applies to sufferings in the moral order. Do we avoid those that we dislike…people that God has placed in our path? Do we avoid any kind of humiliation? Do we avoid an act of obedience that is painful to our nature? If so, we are running from the best opportunities for sacrifice and mortifying our self-love. Even if we substitute with another mortification, this will not have the same effect as those which are chosen by God Himself…those mortifications that He has especially prepared for us. Imagine that! God knows exactly what is needed for our sanctification and He chose these sacrifices Himself for each soul. No two souls are alike, so the mortifications will differ with every individual soul. With the mortifications ordained by Divine Providence there is no involvement of our own will and preferences. They strike us just where we need it most (smile).
How Lent Can Change Us
I move my furniture around a lot. So much, that our sweet, young piano teacher teases me about it when she arrives for lessons and the piano is in a different spot for the third time since Christmas. I’ve done this wherever we’ve lived, no matter the furniture. Sometimes it drives Mr. Smith mad, sometimes he’s grateful for the fresh feel of the room. It’s partly because I’m always thinking about a better way to do things, and partly because sometimes change just feels good.
It’s that feeling of goodness in change that has me reflecting on the value of Lent right now.
I recently witnessed a discussion between a few Catholic women and one woman of another Christian denomination. One of the Catholics had mentioned what she was “giving up” for Lent, and the other woman questioned the purpose of giving something up at all. Her point was that Jesus already completed the sacrifice for us. I wholeheartedly disagree with this, on so many levels, and am so grateful for a Faith that encourages me to sacrifice and fast in preparation for the most important feast of the year. However, there are many people who can reflect on the deeper meaning of Lent and uniting our suffering with Christ’s far more eloquently than I can.
What’s got me thinking right now, in our Lenten journey for this year, is the feeling of change. Regardless of the reasons behind the traditions we practice throughout the Liturgical Year, the result is a difference, a change of practice and perspective. The physical changes in my home and church: The crown of thorns at the center of our table, the simpler foods coming from the kitchen, the purple undertones to remind us of the season, the extraordinary crucifix that Monsignor only displays during this season. The spiritual changes: A more solemn atmosphere and deeper prayer life, the return of our daily Chaplet of Divine Mercy, the focus shift from that dangerous more, more, more to a concentration on paring down, an appreciation of simplicity. Daily, hourly, reminders that what we have is always too much and more than we deserve.
Which brings about the change in my heart.
Recently, I woke up for one of my routine pregnancy-induced trips to the bathroom in the wee hours of the night. With it came the typical thoughts: Oh, here we go again. I don’t want to get up… it’s cold. This is only going to get worse in the coming weeks and months, and it’s so hard to get back to sleep — And suddenly I stopped myself. I thought of women throughout time and distance who have endured and embraced pregnancy and the privilege of bringing forth life for God. I thought of women who live out their pregnancies in mud huts with no plumbing, in homeless shelters with no hope, in relationships with no love — and I knew. I knew that what I have is too much.
So this Lent I will offer some of it back to our Lord. I will let the season do its work of change, in my home, my heart, and, God-willing, my life.
Lenten Book Club
Today we are going to discuss Day 29 from our Lenten Reading Plan with St John Vianney.
Ah…envy. This was a short but sweet, relatively speaking, selection. St Vianney got right to the point didn’t he? We walk, my children, in the footsteps of the devil; like him, we are vexed at good, and rejoice at evil. I do not want to walk in the footsteps of the devil!
1. How does envy sneak into our lives through pride?
2. How can envy manifest itself as a false sense of charity?
Join us in the comments to discuss the sin of envy. Next Wednesday we will be discussing Day 36 of our Lenten Reading Plan. Don’t forget to pray for our priests!
Lenten Book Club
Today we are going to discuss Day 22 from our Lenten Reading Plan with St John Vianney.
Ok, I will say right off the bat, death is not my favorite subject. I have always had this fear, obsessive fear, with dying that only got worse after having children.
I wish I could say it was a fear based in offending God and losing my soul, but no, it was a fear of leaving what I love, and wondering how they would my family would survive without me…how’s that for pride?
I was speaking to priest one time about this fear and what would my husband and children do without me, and his reply? “If God takes your life while they are young, it will be for their good.” Are you kidding me?! For their good to be without their mother? But if we believe that all things work together for the glory of God, then yes, for their good.
And so now I try to look at death from the perspective of gaining my eternal salvation so I can be of good to my children while in heaven. And that’s what this passage of our Lenten reading is all about, preparation for death.
1. How does one prepare spiritually for death without becoming obsessivly consumed with thoughts of death?
2. How is Lent helpful in this preparation?
St Joseph, whose holy feast we are getting ready to celebrate on the 19th, is the patron of a holy death. A traditional practice is to honor the foster father of our Lord on Wednesday’s. Here is a prayer to St Joseph for a happy death…
PRAYER FOR A HAPPY DEATH
O Glorious St. Joseph, behold I choose thee today for my special patron in life and at the hour of my death. Preserve and increase in me the spirit of prayer and fervor in the service of God. Remove far from me every kind of sin; obtain for me that my death may not come upon me unawares, but that I may have time to confess my sins sacramentally and to bewail them with a most perfect understanding and a most sincere and perfect contrition, in order that I may breathe forth my soul into the hands of Jesus and Mary. Amen
Join us in the comments for this week’s discussion. Remember next week we will discuss Day 29 of our Lenten Reading Plan. Don’t forget to pray for our priests!
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