How is it that we as Christians, and more specifically Catholics, can find ourselves benefitting from a deeply personal relationship with our Liturgical seasons? How can we learn to not just go through the motions of prayers and functionalities of our faith but truly embrace the enrichment of our spiritual, emotional, mental, and physical life during the opportunities presented in these moments, hours, days, and weeks of this Lenten season? How does having an interactive relationship with the scripture and gospels help us to live the seasons of our years (and even our lives) with more intention, awareness, and growth in our relationships with Christ and one another? What is the objective of dedicating ourselves to our religion or faith if we are not genuinely on a journey to learn where and how Christ wants to transform us with His love?
Are these questions that we ask ourselves enough?
I found myself really taking time before the start of this Lenten season to ask questions of myself and friends who practice their faith. I have been pondering more so the gift that God bestowed upon us of the exemplary relationship of divinity and humanity in the Blessed Mother and Jesus. All of us in the family of humanity get the opportunity to experience grief and loss while we are here in our lifetimes. The Blessed Mother’s lamentations and grief are one of the grandest examples of suffering in the human experience. Parallel to this is the endurance of physical tortures and the evils of hatred in the hearts of people that was bestowed upon Jesus in the carrying of his cross and ultimate sacrifice through the crucifixion. The loftiest visuals of the most challenging aspects of the human experience are the catalysts in which God bestowed His greatest love story through the grand mercy in the sacrifice of His one true son – made in His image, pleasing to Him, both fully human and fully divine. How can any of us truly grasp how much love that is, and how can we wrap our reasoning around the relationship of sacrifice, suffering, and laying down our lives for our friends as being true love?
As we are on our lenten journeys this year, we continue to be called to conversion. To surrender ourselves to the will of God and grow in virtues along the way. To fast, to pray, and to give alms. Along with our prayers and the recentering of the importance of the gospel in our lives; I hope the visuals and questions asked in this small writing may be helpful to ponder. As we pray from our heads and meditate on in our hearts to hear what the Lord is telling us. May all the solemn moments, small sacrifices, and generous giving bear everyone a fruitful harvest on Easter and in Eastertide.
Cassandra Zygmont