As we approach Ash Wednesday, let us reflect on Pope Benedict XVI’s 2012 Lenten Message. He draws his reflection from the New Testament’s Letter to the Hebrews (10:24): “Let us be concerned for each other, to stir a response in love and good works.”
In our latest issue of CCSJ’s Newsletter, CCSJ shares this Lenten Message with readers. Central to our Catholic identity are love and service (see Matthew 25:35-36). Today’s Gospel (Mk 2:1-12) demonstrates the kind of love we should have for our neighbour. When the four men carrying their paralytic friend could not get through the front door to see Jesus, they stripped the roof and lowered in Jesus’ midst the stretcher on which the paralytic lay. That is love. That is faith. Let us strip the roof of our hearts and let love of God and neighbour flow in and out freely.
Here are some of the key issues raised in the Pope’s message. He reminds us that serving others is “the very heart of Christian life.” He says to “be concerned” for others means, “to be attentive” to the activities of our neighbours. “All too often, however, our attitude is just the opposite: an indifference and disinterest born of selfishness and masked as a respect for ‘privacy’…The great commandment of love for one another demands that we acknowledge our responsibility toward those who, like ourselves, are creatures and children of God.
“Concern for others entails desiring what is good for them from every point of view: physical, moral, and spiritual…Today, too, the Lord’s voice summons all of us to be concerned for one another. Even today God asks us to be ‘guardians’ of our brothers and sisters, to establish relationships based on mutual consideration and attentiveness to…the integral well-being of others.”
He asks us “to recognise in others a true ‘alter ego’, infinitely loved by the Lord…If we cultivate this way of seeing others as our brothers and sisters, solidarity, justice, mercy and compassion will naturally well up in our hearts.”
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“We should never be incapable of showing mercy towards those who suffer. Our hearts should never be so wrapped up in our affairs and problems that they fail to hear the cry of the poor.”
But there is hope. He says: “goodness does exist and will prevail, because God is ‘generous and acts generously’” through all of us who work on behalf of “life, brotherhood/sisterhood and communion.”
“In a world which demands of Christians a renewed witness of love and fidelity to the Lord, may all of us feel the urgent need to anticipate one another in charity, service and good works…This is a favourable time to renew our journey of faith, both as individuals and as a community, with the help of the word of God and the sacraments. This journey is one marked by prayer and sharing, silence and fasting, in anticipation of the joy of Easter.”
He also focuses on the issue of “fraternal correction” (an important form of charity), and personal holiness: “Christ himself commands us to admonish a brother/sister who is committing a sin. It is important to recover this dimension of Christian charity. We must not remain silent before evil….Christian admonishment, for its part, is never motivated by a spirit of accusation or recrimination. It is always moved by love and mercy and springs from genuine concern for the good of the other…In a world pervaded by individualism, it is essential to rediscover the importance of fraternal correction, so that together we may journey towards holiness. Scripture tells us that even ‘the upright falls seven times’ (Prov 24:16); all of us are weak and imperfect (cf1 Jn 1:8).”
During our Lenten journey, let us all do as the Holy Father says, and aim for the “high standard of ordinary Christian living.” CCSJ prays that during this holy season of Lent we will all grow in our relationship with God and with each other. May God grant us the grace we need to revitalise our Catholic culture and identity.
