How Well Do I Know Myself?

More times than not, the month of February accompanies the beginning of the penitential season of Lent. This year, Ash Wednesday will be on February 17th. All of our parishes and schools will mark this day with the blessing and donning of ashes. Some of us will also engage in fasting and abstinence. The Scriptures for Ash Wednesday will remind us of the need to perform acts of charity and an increase in our prayer life. Seems like a lot of expectations the Church places on us at a time when many of us are experiencing difficulty in the pandemic.

Might I suggest that this year, this Lent, you and I approach this season by an exercise that will certainly make us better prepared for the season itself, and its culmination in Holy Week and the commemoration of the suffering death and resurrection of the Lord?

The first part of this exercise is answering a sobering question, “how well do I know myself?” There’s a risk in asking this question, because for most of us, it surfaces an answer (or answers) that tells us that there are things about our individual lives that need to be changed for the better. Just re-reading the Ash Wednesday Gospel (Matthew 6: 1-6,16-18), where Jesus admonishes us to be a) more charitable to others without calling attention to ourselves; b) to be more prayerful in our lives, especially in the quiet of our rooms, and c) to be self-sacrificing, not for show, but to discipline ourselves in conformity with the self-sacrificing life of the Lord – we do these things because, for most of us, we “need” to do these things as they help us to conform our lives with Jesus.

And after all, isn’t that what the Lenten season is all about? Conforming our lives to the Lord? To do so means that we undergo internal changes that make us more like Jesus.

I don’t pretend that such changes are easy – in fact, more than the New Years Resolutions we make and quickly forget, these Lenten promises bring about a change in our lives that can make all the difference in our spiritual journey.

I ask you to join me as February arrives to make this year’s penitential season the most fruitful one we have ever had – and then anticipate with tremendous joy the greatest feast of our year – Easter. May you be blest in your journey.