ASH WEDNESDAY 2008

Joel 2:12-18

II Cor 5:20-6:2

Matthew 6:1-6, 16-18

In a little while we will have ashes imposed on our heads and I will say: “Reform your lives and believe in the Gospel.”

This simple phrase, like a few others in the Bible, sums up the message of Jesus. It is the program of our lives and the call of the church this Lent. Ash Wednesday begins the annual cycle that leads to the Cross, the tomb, the Resurrection and the sending of the Spirit. In the six weeks of Lent and the seven weeks of Easter the Church goes into a prolonged retreat. She breaks the Word of God for us with special power, teaching us in many and varied ways the wonders that God has worked for us, the meaning of our Christian lives and how we ought to live them.

Like all retreats, it is a time of special grace. God is present and at work among his people at all times, yet he, too, exhorts us today: Now is the favorable time, now is the day of salvation. God observes times and seasons, knowing the weakness of our human condition and the very structure of human life. We need alternation, change and variation. “To live is to change,” Cardinal Newman said, “and to be perfect is to have changed much.” Our lives are not straight lines or perfect circles. They are ups and downs, and the liturgical week and the liturgical year fit into this pattern.

And so at the beginning of Lent the Church puts on a more somber dress and says to us: Now is the time for a little more seriousness about your Christian calling. Now is the time for renewal in your lives, for reflection on where you've been and where you're going. And it is, above all, a time to look upon the great things that God has done for you in Christ, to contemplate the Paschal Mystery by which he has redeemed you and to renew your faith and commitment to him.

“Reform your lives and believe in the Gospel.”

One way in which the retreat character of Lent/Easter is brought to the fore are the many allusions we find in the liturgy to Baptism. For many centuries Easter and Pentecost were the two times in the year when Christians celebrated the sacrament of initiation. The Lenten and Easter seasons provided prime material for baptismal preparation and vestiges, implicit and explicit, still remain in our renewed liturgy.

How does the Church view Baptism? She sees it as the struggle between death and life, between the old man and the New, between Satan and Christ. The people of the Old Covenant went through the struggle, Jesus went through the struggle and now the arena is within our hearts. What was written of old, what was fulfilled in Jesus must again be renewed in us if we are to have any part in God's salvation. Isn't this both our glory and our burden? Our glory surely, for we enter into something that is not unique to ourselves. We follow our fathers and mothers, our brothers and sisters in the faith. We follow Jesus and let his seed of life grow in us. Our burden on the other hand, for it is a struggle, a daily struggle. Satan is cast out only little by little; the Church must continually exorcise him as she did for the early catechumens. The readings from the Word are usually consecutive, telling us the story of God's dealings page-by-page, chapter by chapter. The Eucharist is our way bread, giving us strength to carry on day by day.

“Reform your lives and believe in the Gospel.”

A theme taken up through this season, especially in the Sunday liturgies, and given new meaning and emphasis as we progress towards the Pasch of the Lord.

Turn from Satan, adhere to Christ.

Leave your old life, ascend the mountain of God.

Murmur not in the desert, but ask the living water of Jesus.

Judge not as mortals judge, but believe in the Light which is Jesus.

Let your dry bones be enlivened by the Spirit that Jesus breathes on you.

Whether on not the key of baptismal recommitment is used explicitly by any of us this holy season of retreat, let us again take up the bright armor of God, Word and Sacrament, and cling to Jesus, that Holy Week and Pentecost may find us receptive to his power, a power that alone can truly effect reform and growth in our lives through faith, hope and love.

Amen.