Lent: a time to renew faith, hope, and charity.

Dear brothers and sisters:

When Jesus announces to his disciples his passion, death, and resurrection, to fulfill the Father’s will, he reveals the profound meaning of his mission and urges them to join it, for the salvation of the world.

Walking the Lenten path, which will lead us to the Easter celebrations, let us remember Him who “humbled himself, becoming obedient unto death, and a death on the cross” (Phil 2:8). In this time of conversion, let us renew our faith, quench our thirst with the “living water” of hope, and receive with open hearts God’s love that makes us brothers and sisters in Christ. On Holy Saturday night, we will renew our Baptismal promises, to be reborn as new men and women, thanks to the work of the Holy Spirit. However, the journey of Lent, like all the Christian path, is already illuminated by the Light of the Resurrection, which energizes the feelings, attitudes, and decisions of those who wish to follow Christ.

Fasting, prayer, and almsgiving, as Jesus presents them in his preaching (cf. Mt 6:1-18), are the conditions and expressions of our conversion. The way of poverty and deprivation (fasting), the gaze and gestures of love toward the wounded man (almsgiving), and filial dialogue with the Father (prayer) allow us to embody sincere faith, a living hope, and active charity.

1. Faith calls us to embrace the Truth and to be witnesses before God and our brothers and sisters.

In this Lenten season, embracing and living the Truth manifested in Christ means above all allowing ourselves to be reached by the Word of God, which the Church transmits from generation to generation. This Truth is not a construct of the intellect, intended for a few chosen, superior, or illustrious minds, but a message we receive and can understand thanks to the intelligence of the heart, open to the greatness of God who loves us before we are even aware of it. This Truth is Christ himself, who, fully embracing our humanity, became the Way — demanding but open to all — leading to the fullness of Life.

Fasting lived as an experience of deprivation, for those who live it with simplicity of heart, leads to rediscovering God’s gift and understanding our reality as creatures who, in His image and likeness, find their fulfillment in Him. Experiencing accepted poverty, the one who fasts becomes poor with the poor and “accumulates” the wealth of love received and shared. Understood and practiced this way, fasting contributes to loving God and neighbor, as, according to Saint Thomas Aquinas, love is a movement that centers attention on the other, considering him as oneself (cf. encyclical Fratelli tutti, 93).

Lent is a time to believe, that is, to receive God into our lives and allow Him to “dwell” in us (cf. Jn 14:23). Fasting means freeing our existence from everything that hinders, including the saturation of information — true or false — and consumer products, to open the doors of our hearts to Him who comes to us poor of everything but “full of grace and truth” (Jn 1:14): the Son of God, the Savior.

2. Hope as “living water” that allows us to continue our journey

The Samaritan woman, to whom Jesus asks for a drink at the well, does not understand when He tells her that He could offer her a “living water” (Jn 4:10). At first, naturally, she thinks of material water, while Jesus refers to the Holy Spirit, whom He will give abundantly in the Paschal Mystery and who infuses in us the hope that does not disappoint. When announcing his passion and death, Jesus already proclaims hope, when He says: “And on the third day, he will rise” (Mt 20:19). Jesus speaks to us of the future that the mercy of the Father has opened wide. Waiting with Him and thanks to Him means believing that history does not end with our errors, violences, and injustices, nor with the sin that crucifies Love. It means being satisfied with the Father’s forgiveness in His open Heart.

In the current context of concern in which we live, where everything seems fragile and uncertain, talking about hope might seem provocative. Lent is made for waiting, for turning our gaze again to God’s patience, which continues to care for His Creation, even as we often mistreat it (cf. encyclical Laudato si’, 32–44). It is hope in reconciliation, to which Saint Paul passionately exhorts us: “Be reconciled with God” (2 Cor 5:20). By receiving forgiveness in the Sacrament at the heart of our conversion process, we also become messengers of forgiveness: having received it ourselves, we can offer it, capable of living attentive dialogue and adopting a behavior that comforts those who are wounded. God’s forgiveness, also through our words and gestures, allows us to live a Pasch of fraternity.

During Lent, let us be more attentive to “saying words of encouragement, that comfort, strengthen, console, and stimulate,” rather than “words that humiliate, sadden, irritate, and despise” (encyclical Fratelli tutti, 223). Sometimes, to give hope, it is enough to be “a kind person, who sets aside anxieties and urgencies to pay attention, to offer a smile, to say a word that stimulates, to create a space for listening amid so much indifference” (ibid, 224).

In the quiet and silence of prayer, hope is given to us as inspiration and inner light, illuminating the challenges and decisions of our mission: for this reason, it is essential to withdraw into prayer (cf. Mt 6:6) and find, in intimacy, the Father of tenderness.

Living Lent with hope means feeling that, in Jesus Christ, we are witnesses of the new time, in which God “makes all things new” (cf. Rev 21:1-6). It means receiving the hope of Christ, who gives his life on the cross and whom God raises on the third day, “always ready to give an explanation to everyone who asks us for a reason for our hope” (cf. 1 Pet 3:15).

3. Charity, lived in the footsteps of Christ, showing attention and compassion for each person, is the highest expression of our faith and hope.

Charity rejoices in seeing the other grow. For this reason, it suffers when the other is distressed: alone, sick, homeless, despised, in need… Charity is the impulse of the heart that makes us go out of ourselves and that fosters the bond of cooperation and communion.

“Starting from ‘social love,’ it is possible to advance toward a civilization of love to which we can all feel called. Charity, with its universal dynamism, can build a new world because it is not a sterile feeling but the best way to achieve effective paths of development for all” (FT, 183).

Charity is a gift that gives meaning to our lives, and thanks to it, we consider those deprived of what is necessary as members of our family, friends, brothers. The little we have, if shared with love, never ends but transforms into a reserve of life and happiness. This is what happened with the flour and oil of the widow of Zarephath, who gave bread to the prophet Elijah (cf. 1 R 17:7-16); and with the loaves Jesus blessed, broke, and gave to the disciples to distribute among the people (cf. Mk 6:30-44). It also happens with our almsgiving, whether large or small, if given with joy and simplicity.

Living a Lent of charity means caring for those suffering, abandoned, or distressed because of the COVID-19 pandemic. In such an uncertain future, let us remember the word God addresses to His Servant: “Do not fear, for I have redeemed you” (Is 43:1). Let us offer with our charity a word of trust, so that the other may feel that God loves him as His child.

“Only with a gaze transformed by charity, which leads to perceiving the dignity of the other, are the poor discovered and valued in their immense dignity, respected in their own style and culture, and therefore truly integrated into society” (FT, 187).

Dear brothers and sisters: Every stage of life is a time to believe, hope, and love. This call to live Lent as a path of conversion and prayer, and to share our goods, helps us reconsider, in our community and personal memory, the faith that comes from the living Christ, the hope animated by the breath of the Spirit, and love, whose inexhaustible source is the merciful heart of the Father.

May Mary, Mother of the Savior, faithful at the foot of the cross and in the heart of the Church, sustain us with her attentive presence, and may the blessing of the risen Christ accompany us on the way to the Easter light.

Rome, Saint John Lateran, November 11, 2020, feast of Saint Martin of Tours.

Francisco

Source: Vatican.va