WHAT IS LENTEN SEASON?

Lent is a season of preparation for the coming and remembrance of the resurrection of our Lord Jesus on Easter Sunday. We begin this season of Lent, forty days prior to Holy Week and Easter, in remembrance of our Lord’s fasting for the forty days in the desert, the forty days of the flood, and the forty years of the Hebrews wandering in the desert to the Promised Land. This is a special time of deep inner repentance of our sins and inner renewal as well as our acknowledgment of our utter dependence on God our Creator and his love for us (John 4:9-10). This is a time to realize that apart from Jesus we can do nothing because he is the way, the truth, and the life (John 14:6). We realize how much Jesus loves each and every one of us, a love that went to the cross for our sin that destroyed our death by rising on Easter morning. He has giving us redemption and made possible our eternal salvation to those who follow Him. We share in his suffering and those of the whole world who are oppressed, poor, hungry, sick and in need, by self-denial and by charity (Matthew 16:24; 25:31-46). We begin the season of Lent on Ash Wednesday and receive blessed ashes on our forehead in the sign of the cross (Jeremiah 6:26). As the priest places the ashes on your forehead he says, “Dust you came and to dust you will return” or “reject sin and receive the Gospel”. This is to remind us that life is short and temporary in this world and that our time spent here should be used in the following God’s will for us so that we may receive everlasting life with him in heaven (Matthew 11:21; John 3:16). They also remind us that we will soon be renewing our baptismal promises at Easter. The ashes come from burnt palm leaves from the previous years Palm Sunday Mass which takes place the Sunday before Easter as a remembrance of our Lord Jesus triumphant entry into Jerusalem (Matthew 21:1-11). The ashes are also an outward sign of our inner conversion of our hearts to our Lord.