If you were invited to the wedding of a famous person, chances are you’d make some changes to prepare for this once-in-a-lifetime event. You’d probably get some new clothes, maybe freshen up your hairstyle or even give yourself a new look so you could confidently take your place there.
In fact this is exactly what Lent is. It’s not just about making yourself a better person, but to make us worthy to celebrate the great lifetime events of Holy Week, centered in Jesus. The Church even uses the imagery of Jesus as the bridegroom, which dates back from the earliest centuries, because Christ has wedded Himself to us, His Church, His believers.
Why are these events great? They sum up everything we believe.
Christ was fully human. He encountered not only the good, but the bad as well. In all things — positive and negative, sin and virtue, He is present, even in death. He defeated the world’s evil, which is our human sin, not by running from the suffering it caused, but by running toward it, giving His life to beat it.
We can’t celebrate God’s Son alive on Easter morning, coming back from the dead, if He is not alive in us. We all know there is a big difference between doing something we have to do, out of obligation, and doing something we want to do, an intentional choice.
Lent is an opportunity to choose to do something for God — to offer God something more, so you can become something more.
The Church offers us three ways to do this in this sacred time:
Prayer is one way. We think it’s about being alone with God, offering our thoughts to Him; but it’s really about making ourselves available to God, for what He wants from us.
Fasting is another. We think of fasting as doing without something, but fasting is about finding more — depriving ourselves of one thing, to make room for something more. It’s preparing us for the mission where Christ wants us to go, and the sacrifice it will require.
Almsgiving is a long tradition. It literally means giving mercy, doing good for others. For most it means giving money to a charity, letting someone else do the work by writing a check. So much more is expected of us. It should be actually doing — acts of generosity that bring mercy to others. It demands us to receive Christ in the poor, wherever we meet Him, even when inconvenient. We give away what we have, preparing ourselves for the day everything is surrendered, the day our earthly, mortal, temporary lives end.
The best kind of almsgiving, giving mercy, is that which does not reward us, make us feel good about ourselves because we are serving others, for then we are more like Christ, unrecognized, unappreciated by many.
Lent, prayer, fasting, giving alms and mercy — ways to be found worthy to take our place celebrating the great event of the resurrected bridegroom Jesus; now, and in our life to come.
