“Jesus told his disciples a parable,
‘Can a blind person guide a blind person?
Will not both fall into a pit?
. . . .
Why do you notice the splinter in your brother’s eye,
but do not perceive the wooden beam in your own?
How can you say to your brother,
“Brother, let me remove that splinter in your eye,”
when you do not even notice the wooden beam in your own eye?
You hypocrite!  Remove the wooden beam from your eye first;
then you will see clearly
to remove the splinter in your brother’s eye.
. . . .
For every tree is known by its own fruit.
. . . .
A good person out of the store of goodness in his heart produces good,
but an evil person out of a store of evil produces evil;
for from the fullness of the heart the mouth speaks.’” from Luke 6:39-45

This is a perfect Gospel for the Sunday before Ash Wednesday, for a good Lent is a forty-day period during which we do more than engage in prayer, fasting and almsgiving in a way that adds inconsequential actions to our daily routines. This yearly season leading up to the celebration of Jesus’ suffering, death and Resurrection is meant to be a time for us to engage with Jesus in removing what has contaminated or weakened our commitment to what we promise to become in our Baptismal promises which we will renew at our Easter Sunday Liturgy. What are we to promise God on Ash Wednesday and how renewed will we be on Easter?

• What in me, in my ways of thinking, speaking, listening and acting has to be sifted out of the wheat with a God-focused sieve so that I will rise to newness of life with Jesus on Easter?
• What must I do to consent and enable God, not myself and others, to be the potter who is molding me into whatever God desires?
• What can I do that will enable me to speak words and produce deeds which, rather than originating in the dictates of my own mind , they are welling up from the longing for God that was implanted in me at the very beginning of my life – which the Holy Spirit’s graces have been offered but rejected by me?
• How much better of a Christ-follower, a true disciple, will I be during the rest of my life because I, like Jesus, am offering my life to God for others?

“When a sieve is shaken, the husks appear;
so do one’s faults when one speaks.
As the test of what the potter molds is in the furnace,
so in tribulation is the test of the just.
The fruit of a tree shows the care it has had;
so too does one’s speech disclose the bent of one’s mind.
Praise no one before he speaks,
for it is then that people are tested.” Sirach 27:4-7

Suggestion: Ponder Walking the Christian Path

Sister Loretta