Ready or not, Lent begins this week. Our foreheads are smudged with ashes as a reminder that we should spend the 40 days working on a conversion of heart. When we make our decisions about what we may “give up” for Lent, the decision should be informed by our desire to align ourselves more closely to Christ who gave up his life for us. In his sacrifice on the Cross, it hurt Jesus to love us so much. We are not called to that same kind of sacrifice, but we are called to love. In our praying, fasting, and almsgiving, we must work on how we love God, family, the stranger, the poor, the outcast, the sick, and the suffering. In this penitential season of the Church year, we ought to stand at the foot of the Cross and look up and thank Jesus for his exquisite act of love in which our sins are forgiven, and we are forever united to a merciful Savior who walks with us in our own suffering.
At Saint Aloysius this Lent we have many opportunities to come together as a family of faith to reflect on Christ’s suffering, dying, and rising – the Paschal Mystery. Please pick up a copy of “Ashes to Easter” and join us for Mass, the Sacrament of Reconciliation, the Stations of the Cross, reflections on our life with Christ and one another, and more. Read the entire booklet before Ash Wednesday and mark those moments of prayer, service, and sacrifice in which you will participate. As a parish family, let’s make this Lent the Lent where we take our ashes seriously – as a challenge to turn our hearts closer to Christ and one another. I look forward to walking the journey with you.
Lenten blessings,
