1st Sunday of Lent The Good News = God loves us, infinitely

“God will get you for that Walter” this is the spirituality of Maude. Maude was a show in the 70’s, a spinoff of “All in the Family.” That was Maude’s catch phrase to her husband when he displeased her, which was quite often.

Ash Wednesday was a few days ago. Do people realllllly understand that in no way is it obligatory, necessary, mandated that we receive ashes. Yet, every year I receive phone calls, emails, messages from people asking that if they don’t get the ashes will God get angry. They think they commit a horrible sin.

People in the sacrament of Reconciliation: they can be frightened that if they do not confess every minute offense, real or imagined, God will get them. People going through hardship can be scared that they have offended God and God is getting back at them. We even see this on the news: inevitably whenever some natural disaster some jerk equates it with God’s wrath; usually on so-called liberals. Interesting that we have not heard anything about Texas??

Where do we get this? Because this is NOT Christianity, it is NOT our Catholic faith.


“Repent and believe in the Gospel (the Good News) Jesus’ message, his core message. This is not a message meant to scare us, but to inspire us!  

I think people often equate a vengeful God from the Old Testament; and yes there are some stories where it can be interpreted that way, but…  There are also many other stories that show God as one who wishes to restore, renew; such as the ending of Noah’s ark. We would say that is a symbolism or foreshadowing of the Resurrection.  Yet, we get tempted to fall back into believing in the mean and vengeful God.

Mark’s Gospel account of Jesus’ temptation in the desert is terse. It does not say what Jesus’ temptations were, just that he was. We can presume that Jesus prevailed over the temptations. Jesus, who knows the truth of the Father, knows how to resist the temptations, the temptation to believe wrong.  Then we come to his epic message “Repent and believe in the Gospel”. Repent, meaning change the direction of our hearts and minds. Not about feeling bad about ourselves. Yes, acknowledge we have gotten off track, but get back onto the right direction.

Believe in the Good News...God loves us no matter what.

God is NOT out to get us. God’s only desire is that we experience God’s love. Jesus' words and deeds make this real. Jesus’ life, words and deed make this known.  And the fullness of this revelation is the Death and Resurrection of Jesus.  Humankind killed, executed the Son of God...God’s response, forgiveness as shown in the Resurrection.  Again, God did not get back at us. God loves us.

Watching children learning to walk and their parents are beautiful. When the child learns to walk there is a lot of falling down, a lot of unsteady steps, paths not quite straight. Loving parents encourage, support, inspire, walk with their children...and soon they are off running.  

This is God.

If God did not punish us for killing his Son, God will not punish us for not getting ashes, for the lies and fibs, and even more serious sins. God wants us to look up, acknowledge that we have fallen, get back and try again.

Too many people don’t get up. The give up. Too many people succumb to the temptation that they are bad, they are worthless, they are not redeemable.  Too many of us tell other people that. Too many equate making mistakes with failure, so they simply give up; stop or worse. Too many of us are more interested in attacking others, rather than lifting each other up.

It has to stop. That is Satan speaking.  
Jesus speaks love, encouragement, forgiveness, redemption.  We as a church are at our best when go, love, listen, lift up, welcome, walk with each other, support others.

I read recently a definition of Patience. The writer, a Catholic theologian, said that Patience is waiting for the goodness of the other to come out. Yet, it is not about us merely stepping aside and waiting the other out, it involves us working with the other to bring out that goodness.  God is infinitely patient with us. God’s desires our transcendence, our growth, becoming all that we can be.

We are in a special time of the year, Lent. It is a time to reflect on that, open ourselves to how that has already happened, so that we can be more open to it as we move forward. It is a time to trust in God’s love, God’s patience with us.  To celebrate hope and joy that come with this.  And to give that to others as well.  People are tired right now, maybe losing hope with COVID. We as Catholics, centered on the Eucharistic love of God are called to be sources of hope, inspiration. It is not up to any one individual here, but to our whole parish and diocese, together.

God loves us, no matter what. God is with us, no matter what. That is pure joy.

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