One With Those Who Suffer

Today the Church remembers the Last Supper of the Lord, and she prepares to embark with Him on the road to Calvary. As Saint John Paul II wrote in his 1991 Message for Lent, it is today that we should become more aware of the intense suffering that Christ experienced:

As Lent draws to its culmination on Holy Thursday, the Liturgy recalls the institution of the Eucharist, the memorial of Christ’s Passion, Death and Resurrection. This Sacrament, in which the Church celebrates the depth of her faith, should lead us to become ever more profoundly aware of the poverty, suffering and persecution which Christ endured.

Not only should we allow this awareness to develop into deep gratitude, but we should also allow it to draw us into deep solidarity with the suffering poor, for the “Son of God, who became poor out of love for us, became one with those who suffer.”

As we find our converted selves completely dependent upon God and His will for us, John Paul II challenges us to see the completely dependent Christ in the poor:

As we look at Jesus Christ, the Good Samaritan, we cannot forget that from the poverty of the manger to the total abandonment of the Cross, he chose to become one with the “least.” Christ teaches us detachment from riches, trust in God and readiness to share. He urges us to look at our brothers and sisters who are poor and suffering from the point of view of one who – in poverty – knows what it is to be totally dependent upon God and to stand in absolute need of him.

Perhaps an encounter with the poor today will help us all to enter more deeply into the mystery of Christ’s Passion, Death and Resurrection. John Paul II was able to do this during his last Lent on earth, for he found himself poor and suffering on death’s doorstep. He died ten years ago today, in fact, and so we ask him to pray for us all, that we may relieve Christ’s suffering in the poor.

The Liberating Road Of Conversion

Do you feel closer to God now than you did at the beginning of Lent? If not, there’s still time during this Holy Week. There is still time to allow His grace to draw you closer to Him.

Why should this be done? Well, as Saint John Paul II said in his 1982 Message for Lent:

If there is still some distance between God and ourselves, that can only be due to us and to the obstacles we place in the way of this coming close: the sin which is in our heart, the injustices that we commit, the hatred and divisions that we foster, everything that still prevents us from loving God with all our heart and our strength. The time of Lent is the special time for purification and penance, so as to allow our Savior to make us his neighbor and save us by his love.

The Church celebrates the Resurrection in six days, and in order to feel the joy of Easter we must realize how much we need a Savior. We must realize how empty we are without the risen Christ. In order to share in the overwhelming happiness experienced by the Apostles, we must undergo a conversion that leads our hearts to the Messiah!

“Penance, conversion: this is the road to follow; not a sad one, but a liberating one suggested by the Lenten period,” John Paul II wrote. Let us experience the freedom of conversion this Holy Week, as we travel with Christ from Calvary to the Resurrection.

St. John Paul II, Pray for Us!

Join Us Tomorrow!

Love Is Not Resentful

Saint John Paul II forgives Mehmet Ali Ağca, the man who made an attempt on his life.
(CNS photo / Arturo Mari, L'Osservatore Romano)

As we’ve said here before, Lent is a time for conversion. It is therefore an “appropriate time for a profound re-examination of life,” Saint John Paul II wrote in his 2001 Message for Lent. The Lord gives us this opportunity to draw closer to Him, and so we must look closely at ourselves in order to see what’s holding us back.

One of those things that might be inhibiting us from reconciliation with Christ is our own refusal to reconcile our differences with others. Yet, forgiveness is the only path to peace in our relationships. And so it is the only path to peace in our relationship with God. Saint John Paul II wrote:

Forgiveness given and received enables a new kind of relationship among people, breaking the spiral of hatred and revenge and shattering the chains of evil, which bind the hearts of those in conflict with one another.

Now reconciling with others is no easy feat. This step towards conversion cannot be taken unless that conversion has already begun, with the grace of God as its guide. As the sainted pontiff wrote, one must trust in God as the Lord’s disciples did:

Brothers and sisters! In commenting upon the Lord’s teaching as he journeys to Jerusalem, Saint John Chrysostom recalls that Christ does not leave the disciples ignorant of the struggles and sacrifices that await them. Jesus stresses that it is hard but not impossible to renounce oneself when one can count on God’s help bestowed on us “through communion with the person of Christ.”

With God’s help and with a “fresh experience of his mercy,” giving and receiving forgiveness is possible, no matter how much hurt there is. God’s grace makes it easier to apologize, to accept an apology, to confess, and to accept forgiveness. And in these moments of reconciliation, there is so much peace. There is so much love!

Sharing Your Lenten Hope

Saint John Paul II reaches out to an ailing man as Blessed Teresa of Calcutta looks on during the pontiff's 1986 visit  to Calcutta.
(CNS photo / Artuo Mari)

Lent is a time of hope. It may not seem like it, but hope has actually been a part of those moments of denial you’ve experienced so far. Remember when you said “no” to that meatball sub last Friday? Or when you spent that extra five minutes with a friend in need? Or perhaps when you prayed a Rosary before going to sleep, even though you were dead tired? In all of those moments, you joined the Lord in the desert, denying yourself of something convenient and comfortable. You instead relied on God for your comfort, allowing Him to draw closer to you and fill you with hope.

In his 1998 Message for Lent, Saint John Paul II challenged the faithful to share this Lenten hope with others. Not only do we come to hope more profoundly in the Lord during this sparser time, but we also become more capable of sharing this hope with those in need. John Paul II wrote: “For a Christian the desert journey represents a personal experience of inadequacy before God, thereby becoming more sensitive to the presence of the poor.”

Jesus Himself became poor so that we might become rich (cf. 2 Cor 8:9). We too can live in solidarity with the poor this Lent, and so come to understand their plight. We can come to understand both their material and spiritual needs. We can see Christ in them! And through serving these poor, St. John Paul II writes, “the light of hope will again be ignited for many people. When with Christ the Church serves the person in need, she opens hearts to a new hope going beyond evil and suffering, beyond sin and death.”

Give Without Pay

In his 2002 Message for Lent, Saint John Paul II challenged the Church with the Lord’s words: “‘You received without paying, give without pay’” (Mt 10:8). “The heavenly Father’s saving plan was completed in the free and total gift to us of the only begotten Son,” the late Holy Father wrote. Man did not deserve such a gift, but out of love, God freely chose to give His own life in order to draw us “back into communion with himself.”

This free and total gift was the perfect sacrifice, and it stands forever as the model of sacrificial love. The Lenten season is a fitting time to recall “the mystery of the Lord’s Death and Resurrection,” as Saint John Paul II wrote, and it is a time when all Christians should “marvel in their heart of hearts at the greatness of such a gift.” 

In recognizing the price of his own redemption, man cannot help but feel profound gratitude for God’s sacrifice. We express this gratitude through prayer, celebration of the Sacraments, and as the late Holy Father reminded the Church, a free and total gift of ourselves:

Since we have received this life freely, we must in turn offer it freely to our brothers and sisters. This is what Jesus asked of the disciples when he sent them out as his witnesses in the world: “You received without paying, give without pay.” And the first gift to be given is the gift of a holy life, bearing witness to the freely given love of God. May the Lenten journey be for all believers an unceasing summons to enter more deeply into this special vocation of ours. As believers, we must be open to a life marked by “gratuitousness,” by the giving of ourselves unreservedly to God and neighbor.

As we accept the gift of grace, given to us through the sacrificial love of God Himself, we cannot help but give it back to Him through lives of holiness and gratuitousness. We cannot help but fall more deeply into our unique vocations and, like Jesus, give our very selves to others without asking anything in return.

Drawing From The Source Of Love

In his 1994 Message for Lent, Saint John Paul II challenged the Church to make the Lenten season one of conversion and growth:

The Lenten Season is the acceptable time which the Lord gives us that we might take up anew our journey of conversion, grow in faith, hope and love, enter more fully into the Covenant willed by God and experience a season of grace and reconciliation.

His challenge is one that asks us to turn back to that relationship we were made for—to return “to the God from whom we have turned away.” The sainted pointiff invites all Chrstians to change their lives in this way, and so better orient themselves for receiving God’s grace and giving themselves as “leaven which gives rise in the heart of the human family…”

There can be no conversion—no turning back—without cultivating a life of prayer in one’s life and in the life of one’s family. Without prayer, one’s gifts can be misguided, lifeless, and hallow. As John Paul II wrote:

In their individual and community prayer [families] receive the Holy Spirit who comes to make all things new in them and through them, opening the hearts of the faithful to concern for all. Drawing from the source of love, all are enabled to transmit this love by their life and their actions.

The Holy Spirit gives purpose to our fasting, and He brings life to our almsgiving. He inspires us to grow in our relationship with God, and He strengthens us to lift up those who are suffering.

We can not make our Lent mean something. It is God who must do that! So let us turn to Him in prayer, and allow Him to guide our Lenten journeys.

For more on Lenten prayer in the family, see the Saint John Paul II National Shrine website.

A Humbled Heart You Will Not Spurn

Have mercy on me, O God, in your goodness;

in the greatness of your compassion wipe out my offense.

Thoroughly wash me from my guilt

and of my sin cleanse me.

A clean heart create for me, O God,

and a steadfast spirit renew within me.

Cast me not out from your presence,

and your Holy Spirit take not from me.

For you are not pleased with sacrifices;

should I offer a burnt offering, you would not accept it.

My sacrifice, O God, is a contrite spirit;

a heart contrite and humbled, O God, you will not spurn.

-Psalms 51:3-4, 12-13, 18-19

Return To The Lord

“Return to the Lord, your God, for he is gracious and merciful...” (Jl 2:13).

With this exhortation taken from the book of the prophet Joel, the Church begins her Lenten pilgrimage, the acceptable time for returning: for returning to God from whom we have turned away. This, in fact, is the meaning of the penitential journey which starts today, Ash Wednesday: to return to the Father's house, bearing in our hearts the confession of our own guilt. The psalmist invites us to say over and over: “Have mercy on me, O God, according to your steadfast love; according to your abundant mercy blot out my transgressions” (Ps 50 [51]:1). With these sentiments, each of us sets out on the Lenten path, in the conviction that God the Father, who “sees in secret” (Mt 6: 4, 6, 18), goes out to meet the repentant sinner as he returns. As in the parable of the prodigal son, he embraces him and lets him understand that, by returning home, he has regained his dignity as a son: “he was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found” (Lk 15: 24).

-Saint John Paul II, Ash Wednesday 1999