“Repentance, Conversion, and Sharing the Love of Jesus with Others”
“Arrepentimiento, Conversión, y Compartiendo el Amor de Jesús con los Demás”
Homily, Rite of Election/Homilía, Rito de Elección (2024)
Introduction
In conversations with people who follow social trends and what is happening in the world, they often ask me what I think about the decline in religious observance so prevalent in our contemporary society. That there is such a decline is certainly undeniable, but, as I tell them, it is not the whole story. We see that in this Rite of Election which we celebrate this afternoon: it is always a high point for us every year in our Archdiocese, when our whole archdiocesan family comes together as one family of God. Tonight is the fruit of the living faith of so many who are seeking to know and spread the love of Jesus Christ. Thank you!
Turning Toward the Lord
It is good that we celebrate this Rite of Election on this first Sunday of Lent when we hear about our Lord’s retreat into the desert before he begins his public ministry, and then the first words out of his mouth when he begins his public preaching. These words should sound familiar to us, as we just heard them spoken when ashes were imposed on our heads last Wednesday: “Repent, and believe in the Gospel.” Repentance is the first step on the path to what this season of Lent is all about: conversion. The word literally means “to turn around”: that is to say, Lent is a time when we are called to turn our lives around toward the Lord; all our life should be oriented toward Him.
Which brings us back to repentance. Repentance is the spiritual conditioning by which we turn ourselves around to face the Lord: having sorrow for our sins; contrition, which means the realization that we have offended God and so deserve His punishment but most of all we are sorry because we have failed to love God Who loves us and Who deserves all of our love; it means begging Him for forgiveness. These forty days of Lent serve as a reminder to us of how our whole life, every day of the year and every day of our lives, is to be lived: oriented toward the Lord. It helps us to put our life in proper perspective in how we stand before God.
We rejoice especially with our catechumens today who are heeding this call to conversion in a fundamental way, as well as our candidates who may have been far away from Christ but have now been brought near through the intervention in some way or another of a brother or sister in the faith. We are grateful to those of you who have shared the love, truth and mercy of Jesus Christ with the catechumens and candidates, and those of you who have been open to receiving these graces in your lives.
Starting from Ash
Conversion, though, is not a “one-and-done” kind of a thing, but a perennial calling in our life, what we call ongoing conversion. Thus, the need for repentance in the form of our Lenten practices of prayer, fasting and almsgiving. These are the three hallmarks of the Christian life and so are not confined to Lent. But we give them a special focus during these forty days in order to sharpen our sensitivity to the importance they have for us to attain spiritual excellence: ensuring that we spend some time every day in prayer, observing penitential disciplines and especially the sacrament of Penance, and generosity with our time, talent and treasure to come to the aid of the poor, vulnerable, and those in need Christ’s life-giving love. The whole point of it is for us to learn how to share, to be generous, and that requires a certain death, death to our selfishness.
That is why it is so appropriate that we begin the season of Lent with the imposition of ashes on our heads. Think about what ash means: it is a sign that all has been destroyed, for after a fire there is nothing left but ash. This means that Lent involves a certain destruction, but a destruction that enables us to be rebuilt into Christ’s image. For without clinging to Christ in this life, our death will mean the destruction emblematic of that which is signified by ash, or, as the other formula for the imposition of ashes on Ash Wednesday has it, dust – a reference to our beginning and end: “Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return.”
Fire and Water: Destruction and Life
Fire is one of the basic elements of creation which is capable of destroying or giving life (such as warmth and the source for cooking and for energy). Our readings for this first Sunday of Lent, though, make reference to another basic element likewise capable of destruction or life: water. In the story of Noah and the flood which we heard about in the first reading, God sends the flood to destroy the wickedness of the earth. But then what do we hear in our second reading, from the first letter of Peter? The waters of the flood “prefigured baptism, which saves you now. It is not a removal of dirt from the body but an appeal to God for a clear conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ.”
We cannot but think with gratitude of our beloved catechumens who will receive these saving waters of baptism, with the old self being destroyed as they clothe themselves with Christ. This is the gift of a “clear conscience,” indeed, the greatest gift of all, a gift which comes from purified motives, desires and intentions, looking only to please God and to do His will.
Likewise those of us who are already baptized are called to strive to live in accordance with this Christian dignity with which God has graced us. Baptism welcomes us into the protective arms of the Church, symbolized by Noah’s ark. The boat is an ancient symbol of the Church, and the scene of Noah’s ark in the flood certainly illustrates well the situation of the Church today: tossed about by violent storms, not of the literal kind but of the spiritual and social kind. We are safe from the destructive power of these floods when we remain within the ark, which is to say, remain true to the saving meaning of water that is given to us in baptism.
Conclusion
Let us, then, pay heed to the call of Lent: to return to the Lord, to reorient our lives toward Him. Pope Francis spoke of this in his homily at Mass a few days ago on Ash Wednesday. I can do no better than to conclude with the words with which he concluded that homily:
Let us return, brothers and sisters. Let us return to God with all our heart. During these weeks of Lent, let us make space for the prayer of silent adoration, in which we experience the presence of the Lord, like Moses, like Elijah, like Mary, like Jesus. Have we noticed that we have lost the sense of worship? Let us return to worship. Let us lend the ear of our hearts to the One who, in silence, wants to say to us: ‘I am your God – the God of mercy and compassion, the God of pardon and love, the God of tenderness and care.’
RESUMEN EN ESPAÑOL
Es bueno que celebremos este Rito de Elección en este primer domingo de Cuaresma cuando escuchamos acerca del retiro de nuestro Señor al desierto antes de comenzar su ministerio público, y luego las primeras palabras que salen de su boca cuando comienza su predicación pública: “Arrepiéntanse y crean en el Evangelio.” Estas palabras deberían sonarnos familiares ya que las acabamos de escuchar pronunciadas cuando las cenizas nos fueron impuestas el miércoles pasado, aunque en la Misa fueron un poco diferentes: “Conviértete y cree en el Evangelio.” La palabra utilizada aquí, “convertir”, es significativa. Literalmente significa “dar la vuelta”: es decir, la Cuaresma es un tiempo en el que estamos llamados a darle vuelta a nuestra vida hacia el Señor; toda nuestra vida debe estar orientada hacia Él. Y este camino de la conversión empieza, y está siempre sostenido, por el arrepentimiento.
Y por eso nos regocijamos con nuestros catecúmenos hoy que están atendiendo este llamado al arrepentimiento y la conversión de manera fundamental, así como nos regocijamos también con nuestros candidatos que tal vez hayan estado lejos de Cristo pero ahora se han acercado a través de la intervención de alguna manera u otra de un hermano o hermana en la fe. Estamos agradecidos con aquellos de ustedes que han compartido el amor, la verdad y la misericordia de Jesucristo, y aquellos que han estado abiertos a recibir estas gracias en sus vidas.
La conversión, sin embargo, no es algo que “se hace una sola vez y basta”, sino que es un llamado perenne en nuestra vida, es lo que llamamos conversión continua. De ahí la necesidad del arrepentimiento en la forma de nuestras prácticas cuaresmales de oración, ayuno y limosna. Estas son las tres características de la vida cristiana y, por lo tanto, no se limitan a la Cuaresma. Pero les damos una atención especial durante estos cuarenta días para agudizar nuestra sensibilidad sobre la importancia que tienen para nosotros para alcanzar la excelencia espiritual: dedicamos un tiempo cada día a la oración, observamos las disciplinas penitenciales y, especialmente, el sacramento de la penitencia, y ejercemos la generosidad con nuestro tiempo, talento y tesoro para ayudar a los pobres, a los vulnerables y a los necesitados del amor vivificante de Cristo. El objetivo es que aprendamos a compartir, a ser generosos, y eso requiere una muerte particular, la muerte de nuestro egoísmo.
Prestemos atención, entonces, a la llamada de la Cuaresma: a volver al Señor, a reorientar nuestra vida hacia Él. De esto habló el Papa Francisco en su homilía en la Misa de hace unos días, el Miércoles de Ceniza. No puedo hacer mejor que concluir con las palabras con las que él concluyó aquella homilía:
Volvamos, hermanos y hermanas. Volvamos a Dios con todo el corazón. En estas semanas de cuaresma, dejemos espacio para la oración silenciosa de adoración, en la que permanecemos en presencia del Señor a la escucha, como Moisés, como Elías, como María, como Jesús. ¿Somos conscientes de que hemos perdido el sentido de la adoración? Regresemos a la adoración. Prestemos el oído de nuestro corazón a Aquel que, en el silencio, quiere decirnos: ‘Soy tu Dios, el Dios de la misericordia y la compasión, el Dios del perdón y del amor, el Dios de la ternura y la solicitud.’