To review previous Pastoral Letters from the Bishop visit the archive.
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To review previous Pastoral Letters from the Bishop visit the archive. |
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A Lenten Pastoral Message
From Bishop Kevin Manning, Catholic Outlook, February 2008
My Dear People,
In 2002, Pope John Paul II described Lent as a providential time for conversion, which helps us to contemplate the stupendous mystery of God's love.
He said: "Lent is a return to the roots of our faith so that in pondering God's gift of grace which the Redemption brings to us, we cannot fail to realise all that is given to us by God's loving initiative. Far be it from us to miss such a providential time for conversion."
In this 2008 Lenten Pastoral Message, I want you to contemplate ongoing conversion, which pretty well sums up the time of Lent. To achieve conversion the Church proposes the practice of prayer, fasting and almsgiving, which help us to overcome our selfishness and sin, and to walk in the way of grace.
Prayer
Thinking of prayer as a means to conversion I suggest that a good start is
attendance at daily Mass during Lent. There is no better way to conform our
lives to Christ than the celebration of the Eucharist.
Since Eucharistic devotion prolongs the celebration of the Sacrifice of the Mass, I encourage you to take every opportunity to spend time before the Blessed Sacrament.
And Lent is as good a time as any to resurrect some of those opportunities for prayer that are offered to us by other devotions: Stations of the Cross, Holy Hours, Days of Recollection, maybe even a parish mission. This list is by no means exhaustive and I am sure enterprising pastors could add to it.
Let us not leave it all up to the community, but think about our own personal prayer, time to spend on our own with God. In this we are responding to Christ's own example and His invitation to us to enter into conversation with Him. It does not need too many distractions to turn our minds and hearts away from Him.
You might think about praying with the Sacred Scriptures, and I will say more about that further on.
Meditation, Rosary, prayers on behalf of others are all well recommended. All prayer helps us to concentrate on Christ, the centre of our lives. It calls us back from much useless activity in our lives and remember always that prayer is the driving force behind any conversion of our hearts back to God.
Fasting
There is no better example of fasting than that of Christ Himself who, at
the beginning of His public ministry, went off into the desert to fast for 40
days and 40 nights.
Fasting is a salutary reminder that our present life is not for always, and that it is paramount that we maintain a clear sense of what is important, what is essential, and what is superficial.
Fasting reminds us that over-concentration on worldly values blinds us to who, and what, really matters. It turns our minds to what really brings us true joy, and simplicity of life.
I suggest a few times for fasting: Ash Wednesday and Good Friday for starters, as these are obligatory. Some people voluntarily observe all the Fridays or even other days of Lent, and I don't discourage you from doing the same.
You might determine to abstain from some specific food, or drink, or even eating between meals. These practices help us to understand what is essential, what is non-essential, and that the things of God really matter.
Television addicts might cut their viewing time, those who criticise curtail their idle gossip, the cynical from their remarks, grumblers their dissatisfaction and shoppers their non-essential purchases.
Almsgiving
John Paul II said once that God allows human need so that by responding to
the needs of others we might well learn to escape from our egotism and
practise real love.
At the time he was emphasising the importance of almsgiving, not only as a Lenten practice but as a key part of Christian living.
Almsgiving targets our self-centredness. To counteract this we need to share what we have with others in order to retain the balance of the Almighty's distribution of the goods of the earth.
You will be amazed how making a real sacrifice of material possessions can open you up to experience solidarity with those who are poor and suffering.
Another form of almsgiving is that of time and talent. Let's face the fact that there are many people in our community who need more than material assistance - the lonely, those in nursing homes, or even isolated neighbours. Visits to the homeless, or the delivery of meals to the hungry, can be a great conversion exercise.
Sacrament of Penance
I encourage you to accept as an essential part of your conversion
frequentation of the Sacrament of Penance. And pastors will need to schedule
extra opportunities for this. For Confession times during Lent in the Diocese
of Parramatta click here.
Don't just confine Reconciliation to the Second Rite, use the opportunity for anonymous, or face-to-face Confession, and let the spirit of repentance grow in your heart.
Divine reading
Finally, I commend to you a special form of daily prayer as part of Lenten
conversion. It is called Lectio Divina (Divine Reading) and is a special way
of communicating with Our Lord for it centres on the revealed Word of God in
the Scriptures.
How does it work? Three steps: the first step is the prayerful reading of a passage from Scripture. Put yourself into the presence of God, and put all other thoughts out of mind before you begin to read the Scriptural passage.
Secondly, apply the words to your life. You are reading the text of the
Scripture in order to pray: What text do you use? Any passage from the Bible,
maybe something from the Gospels, which helps. Don't make the passage too long
otherwise you will lose concentration.
Having chosen the passage from the Sacred Scriptures and read it carefully,
try to understand the full meaning of the words. Put it into the context of
the Gospel from which it appears and reflect on the Church's interpretation of
the text.
After reflecting on the true meaning of the text, apply it to your life and ask the question: What do these words mean to me? That is, apply the Word of God to your life. You should take time to reflect on the many possible meanings of the text for your daily Christian living.
After having studied the meaning of the text and having applied it to your daily life the third step is to pause in silence before God. Let Him speak.
In other words, we simply keep quiet, holding the image of Christ before our eyes and let God speak to our hearts confirming us in our love of Him, and drawing us further into love. Let God have a free go!
Now you probably think this is going to take too much of your time, and are wondering how you can fit it into your day. It doesn't really require much time, maybe 15 minutes.
The important thing is to prepare well by choosing the passage from the Holy Gospels, not taking too long a passage, and by quieting yourself for prayer beforehand.
If you work on this each day you will soon develop a good habit of praying with Christ through the reading of His Word, and being conformed to His Way of living and acting.
So there you have a few suggestions that are going to help you convert back
to Christ during Lent. Don't shirk the task.
