Why Lent?

This day I call the heavens and the earth as witnesses against you that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life, so that you and your children may live
(Deuteronomy 30:19)

Lent is a time for us to reassess the decisions we have made and to reorient our life’s journey. Are we running on the path of the Lord’s commandments? Choices have consequences. Moses begins the passage in Deuteronomy with a stark and dramatic choice – a fork in the road in which one path leads to life and prosperity, the other to death and gloom – but the reality of making that choice is more subtle. Choosing the good path means doing things every day that may seem ordinary: obeying, loving, walking, and keeping. Yet these ordinary practices lead to living, growing, and even occupying a place of blessing and security. Certainly most people are familiar with Robert Frost’s poem, The Road Not Taken


I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I –
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.


If we take the road to life, we will discover the value of love and the joy of being loved. Responding to the call of faith we shall, in fact, be following the road less traveled by. Even though there may be pitfalls along the way, we will know the peace and joy of the Lord. With that peace comes a sense of humor and a joyful spirit. Suddenly we discover that ordinary day to day virtues become the seedbed of gospel living. Today’s gospel reading reminds us that following Christ demands a daily dying to self and embracing the Word of Life. May God prompt our actions by the inspiration of His Spirit, further them with His constant help and bring them to completion in His heavenly Kingdom.

Father Jerome Machar OSCO