One of the great images of Lent is Jesus being driven into the desert where he goes toe-to-toe with Satan. As real as Jesus’ temptations are to pleasure, fame, and power, they are but expressions of a more fundamental and deceptively obvious one: the temptation to forget who and whose you are.
There is something I find at Mass on Ash Wednesday that I don’t find elsewhere. Nowhere besides here do I step in line with old ladies in purple sweaters, fellow students, elderly widows, the nuns, the homeless, the workers on lunch hour, the priests, and the University president to face our shame, imperfections, and our transgressions, together.
Ash Wednesday is just one week away. Before you decide to give up candy or french fries or even Facebook, I encourage you to take some advice: do nothing.
The mystery of wonder involved in the Spiritual Exercises consists of meeting people in their spiritual journeys with God. The wonder includes accompanying with love and compassion, helping people remember they are precious creatures of creation.
I’m a proud son of Green Bay, WI, and I have plenty of Packers apparel in my wardrobe. The other day I was at the gym, and given my workout clothing rotation, it happened that I was wearing a Packers t-shirt and shorts – green and gold from head to toe.
“And when you are before God, utterly defenseless, then you will see the love of God…”
A stately-looking older gentleman walked into the classroom and introduced himself as the professor. After a terse jaunt through the syllabus, he looked up from the podium suddenly and posed the question: Who here believes that a person can change?
As we celebrate the life of Reverend Martin Luther King Jr., may this prayer, for all those who pray it, be a means to avail ourselves of God’s gracious gift and so “receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need” (Heb. 4:16).
In the last year, a small phrase from the Mass I’d not previously paid much attention to, I learned to love. It is the preface to the Our Father when the priest says, “At the savior’s command and formed by divine teaching, we dare to say…”
When I was in grade school, I forced myself to try out for the basketball team. I never liked basketball, wasn’t particularly fast, couldn’t shoot the ball, and preferred to sit on the bench. But, everyone else was doing it, and their participation convinced me that I needed to join in.