Daybreaks: Daily Reflections for Lent & Easter

by Ron Rolheiser, OMI

“The Lord will guide you always
and satisfy your thirst in parched places,
will give strength to your bones
and you shall be like a watered garden,
like a flowing spring whose waters never fail.”

(ISAIAH 58:11)

“As human beings, we’re weak and lack the moral strength to always act according to what’s best in us. Sometimes we just succumb to temptation, to weakness. Sin needs no explanation beyond this: we’re human!

Also, sometimes people are caught in sinful situations they didn’t create. They’ve been abused, made to live in sinful circumstances not of their own choosing, are victims of human trafficking, are victims of unjust familial or social situations, or are deeply wounded in other ways that keep them from actualizing their own moral faculties. In situations like this, wrong action is a question of survival, not of free choice. In these cases, generally, beneath an understandable hardened, calloused surface lies a still-innocent heart that clearly knows its need for God’s mercy. There is such a thing as honest sin.  

There’s also sin that’s dishonest, rationalized, that’s forever buffered by a phony pride that can’t admit its own sinfulness. The result then, most often, is a hardened, bitter, judgmental soul. When sin is rationalized, bitterness will invariably follow, accompanied by hatred toward the kine of virtue from which it has fallen. When we rationalize, our moral DNA will not let itself be fooled. It reacts and punishes us by having us hate ourselves. And when someone hates himself, that hatred will issue forth in a hatred of others and, more particularly, in a hatred of the exact virtue from which he has fallen. 
 

[Offering up] false pride for Lent and for all time helps us find ourselves as weak and sinful, which can soften our hearts, make us humble, and open us to receive God’s mercy” (6).   

We reach prayer’s goal when our minds and wills unite with God; it’s a loving communion – union with the Trinity and His Creation. The Eucharist is the highest form of love; a prayer when we’re most united with the Lord. 

Daybreaks: Daily Reflections for Lent & Easter

by Ron Rolheiser, OMI

“Is this not, rather, the fast that I choose:
releasing those bound unjustly,
untying the thongs of the yoke;
setting free the oppressed,
breaking off every yoke?”

(ISAIAH 58:6)

“Too few of us admit that we carry a lot of anger inside of us, that there are places in us that are bitter and resentful, and that there are certain incidents in our lives that we won’t forget and people we won’t forgive.

To camouflage our anger, we like to make a public display of our generosity and goodness. We tend to make a show to family and friends of how we are by praising someone lavishly and then, almost in the same sentence, call someone else a name, slander someone, or speak viciously or sarcastically about someone.  

This proclivity to divide others into either angels or demons is a sure indication that anger is inside of us. We make a display of praising certain people that’s really meant more to publicly exhibit how nice we are than to highlight someone else’s virtues. Then we complain bitterly about how awful some other people are and how we are forever surrounded with idiots. Both the praise and the complaint testify to the same thing. We are living with anger. 
 

Honesty and humility should eventually bring us to admit this. We all carry some anger, and we should not deceive ourselves on this. We need courage and honesty to face up to the anger and do our best – with the help of God – to let it go” (5).   

I grew up thinking that fasting during Lent is synonymous to dieting. But not so now. The goal of Lenten fast: to shed myself off of things that estrange me from others and from God – a freer, more loving, encounter. 

Lord God,
this Lent wash away all my doubts about your love for me, for others,
and for all creation,
that I may proclaim your goodness.
Teach me to become perfect as you are perfect,
in all my ways.
May I, with your help, come to see and love in others your own image and likeness,
especially in those I find difficult.
May my Lenten observance help me to enter into the dying and rising Jesus,
that I may experience and share with others your joy,
and rejoice with a new song in my heart together
with all your children.  

Amen. 

Daybreaks: Daily Reflections for Lent & Easter

by Ron Rolheiser, OMI

“I have set before you life and death, the blessing and the curse. Choose life, then, that you and your descendants may live.” (Deuteronomy 30:19)

“A quality that endeared Henri Nouwen to the world was his candor about his own shortcomings and his refusal to pretend he was anything other than what he was: a sincere, weak man struggling to live his life in honesty.

There were seasons in his life when Nouwen wouldn’t go on the road alone to give talks and conferences. He had a sense of community and wanted a core member from his community to share the experience with him. But the humble Nouwen was also honest enough to know that he couldn’t always fully trust himself to travel alone. The presence of family and community can be a powerful moral watchdog on our behavior. Nouwen understood this.   

Too often we lack that kind of humility and honesty and consequently have things to hide. The little or big secrets we tuck away keep us from full moral health.
 

The human spirit is not made to live in dishonesty and duplicity. When we do wrong, we either have to stop doing wrong or at least own up to our weakness and be contrite. If we don’t get honest, our spirits will begin to harden and warp. Such is the anatomy of the soul. This Lent and always, let’s let go of any duplicity, and get and stay honest.  

For many people, Lent is the time for celebrating the sacrament of reconciliation.

Confession refresher 101
After the initial greetings, the priest then invites the you to express your sins and place them before God for forgiveness and healing. This is best done in a conversational way, and the priest is part of the conversation. 

The priest then gives a “penance” which may be a prayer or a good work that will help bring healing.

You are invited to express sorrow for your sins – a traditional Act of Contrition or a prayer of sorrow in your own words. 

The priest extends his hands over you and says the Prayer of Absolution to which you respond, “Amen.” (If seated, out of reverence for the presence of God’s mercy, some kneel at this point)

You are invited to give thanks to the Lord for his mercy in your own words. Normal “good-byes” are fine as you leave.

Lord God,
this Lent wash away all my doubts about your love for me, for others,
and for all creation,
that I may proclaim your goodness.
Teach me to become perfect as you are perfect,
in all my ways.
May I, with your help, come to see and love in others your own image and likeness,
especially in those I find difficult.
May my Lenten observance help me to enter into the dying and rising Jesus,
that I may experience and share with others your joy,
and rejoice with a new song in my heart together
with all your children.  

Amen. 

Daybreaks: Daily Reflections for Lent & Easter

by Ron Rolheiser, OMI

[Jesus said,] “But when you pray, go to your inner room, close the door, and pray to you Father in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will repay you.” (Matthew 6:6)

“Too many of us need to see punishment befall the wicked. For those who feel that way, knowing that good shall have its day isn’t reward enough. No. The bad must also be punished.

All that worry that somebody might be getting away with something and all that anxiety that God might not be an exacting judge suggest that revenge-seekers, like the older brother in the Prodigal Son parable, might be doing a lot of things right but are missing something important inside themselves. They may be dutiful and moral but bitter underneath and unable to enter the circle of celebration and the dance. 

If we feel wounded and bitter, we’re apt to worry that God’s justice might be too lenient, with inadequate punishment accorded to the bad. The start of Lent on Ash Wednesday is a good time to give up that way of thinking forever. Doing so means less worry about God’s way and more about our own incapacity to forgive, to let go of our hurts, to take delight in life, to give others the gaze of admiration, to celebrate, and to join in the dance. For us to be fit for heaven, bitterness must go.
 

We may have never really felt in our hearts the true and gentle words that the Father spoke to the older brother of the Prodigal Son: “My son, you are here with me always; everything I have is yours. But now we must celebrate and rejoice, because your brother was dead and has come to life again” (Luke 15:31-32). 

In ancient times, many people used ashes for religious, magical, and medical purposes. In the Old Testament, ashes were sprinkled on the head or over the whole body as a sign of mourning and penance.

Receiving ashes on the first day of Lent is a practice that dates back to the fifth century, and by the 11th century was a universal Christian practice. During the Reformation, most Protestant Churches eliminated the use of ashes. In recent years, however, many of these Church have resumed the practice of imposing ashes on Ash Wednesday.