Tag Archives: repentance

Dismiss All Other Loves!

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Red draped the Crucifix as it proceeded amidst waving palm branches – blood red! Shouts of “Hail and hosanna” would soon change to “Crucify!” It is so brief a time to reign and be acknowledged as the Holy One of God.  Our homilist, Fr. Michael De Palma asked what happened? For the Church, not many weeks ago, we were gazing on the face of the Christ Child.  Angels sang and Wise Men bowed low. We sang:

“Sacred Infant, all Divine,

What a tender love was Thine;

Thus to come from highest bliss

Down to such a world as this !

Teach, oh, teach us, Holy Child,

By Thy face so meek and mild.

Teach us to resemble Thee,

In Thy sweet humility !

What happened?  Have we, too, dismissed Him?  He reigns on our calendars, but what about our hearts? What other loves have replaced Him in our day to day?  Can we bear to look upon His disfigured Face?  Can we “Behold the Man?.”

Father Michael invited us to live this week differently from all others, to banish all other loves and gaze upon one bruised and bloodied Face.  Angels trembled at what we had done to the Son of God.  They trembled, too, at what He accomplished on that Cross for me and you.

We will soon sing with the Church around the world:

O Sacred Head, surrounded
by crown of piercing thorn!
O bleeding head, so wounded,
reviled and put to scorn!
Our sins have marred the glory
of thy most holy face,
yet angel hosts adore thee
and tremble as they gaze

I see thy strength and vigor
all fading in the strife,
and death with cruel rigor,
bereaving thee of life;
O agony and dying!
O love to sinners free!
Jesus, all grace supplying,
O turn thy face on me.

(Words Henry Williams Baker after Bernard of Clairvaux)

One Holy Week remains of Lent.  We are invited to walk these days with our Lord to Calvary.  Without the Cross there is no Resurrection, no Easter glory.  With Christ we, too, can rise again to new Life

“When He is King we will give Him the Kings’ gifts,
Myrrh for its sweetness, and gold for a crown…

When He is King they will clothe Him in grave-sheets,
Myrrh for embalming and wood for a crown..

Bethlehem Down – words by Bruce Blunt

Reluctant Prophet

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I’m thinking about Jonah, the reluctant prophet.  He usually pops up in the readings of the Liturgy of the Word during Lent.  He made his appearance yesterday and has been wondering in the back of my mind giving his prophetic word, “Repent!”

Jonah needed to be hurled into the sea (a place of chaos) before he realized there was no escaping his responsibility before God.  Jonah needed a second chance to get it right. Fortunately, for the people of Nineveh (the worldly city of sinners), having gotten Jonah’s attention, God called the prophet a second time.  God was not going to fix things without his servant’s cooperation.

How like Jonah I am.  I need to be carried kicking and screaming to the Lord’s will.  How slow I am to remember that the only sign I’m going to get is the Now of my life.  I do want Resurrection without the Crucifixion.  So, here I sit in the belly of the whale,  my only sign, the sign of the Cross.  As Jonah spent three days in the belly of the great fish (a sign for Christ ) so Jesus spent three days in the tomb, and I must be there with Him waiting with faith.  Maybe, my Now says I have to do something.  Maybe it says I have to change.  Three days with Jesus in the tomb will prepare me for both mission and mercy.

“Who knows, God may relent and forgive, and withhold his blazing wrath,
so that we shall not perish.”
When God saw by their actions how they turned from their evil way,
he repented of the evil that he had threatened to do to them;
he did not carry it out. Jonah 3: 10

Lent – Everyday, a Second Chance

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crucificionicon2Everyday begins with God’s mercy. Everyday is a new beginning.  As we open our eyes on this day, we begin again.  As long as we are living and breathing this side of the Judgment, the sun comes up on our second chance.

Lent is the trumpeter sounding before the Final Trumpet of our lives.  The noise of cacophony is interrupted with a clarion call “Repent.”

“For He says: ‘In an acceptable time. I heard you, and on the Day of Salvation I helped you.’ Behold, now is a very acceptable time; behold, now is the Day of Salvation.”2 Cor 6:2