Last month, as we had just come out of the Christmas Season into Ordinary Time, I reflected on the “epiphany” of Ordinary Time (Part One). In the last two months we have celebrated three different liturgical seasons almost without transition. Part Two of these brief reflections needed a change of title, but I will continue to expand the same idea: how each season within the Church calendar shows us different aspects of the Mystery of Christ. Now we face the Paschal Mystery, which is his Passion, Death, and Resurrection. As much as we delight in his birth, Christ was born to die. We are born to live but Christ became one of us to die for our sins. And that is the crude, and beautiful reality, of Lent and Holy Week.
Mark
The brief transition between Ordinary Time and Lent has an important overlap: the beginning of the Gospel of Mark. During the first weeks of the liturgical year, we heard Christ in Mark’s account telling us: “This is the time of fulfillment. The kingdom of God is at hand”, and an invitation to repent and to believe in the Gospel! The same words of one of the formulas for the imposition of ashes on Ash Wednesday! These are also the words of the gospel for the first Sunday of Lent. Mark is very direct, for instance; he does not give us details about the temptations of Christ as Matthew does, but goes directly into the core of Christ’s message:
“This is the time of fulfillment. The kingdom of God is at hand. Repent, and believe in the gospel.”
Dear friends in Christ: These words are self-explanatory. They reveal the “heart” of our evangelical faith. They are an “epiphany” as Christ reveals himself through his own words and actions. They are a program for us to walk the Lenten desert aided by prayer, penance and works of charity.
The Collect Prayer of the first Sunday of Lent asked that we could come to the knowledge of Christ and bear witness to Him with our conduct. Let us ask the Lord to grant us the grace to find him in prayer this Lent, particularly in the meditation of his Word, to purify our hearts through penance, and to show his face to others especially those most in need, with almsgiving.
Have a fruitful Lent.
Author: The Contribution of Cornelio Fabro to Fundamental Theology. Reason and Faith: htps://www.cambridgescholars.com/product/978-1-5275-9315-2
Poesía Sacra, Quemar las Naves, and Desde Fossanova, IVE Press: htps://ivepress.org/
