In one of the most shocking passages of the Gospels, Matthew 5:20-26, Jesus describes the righteousness one needs in order to reach the kingdom of heaven, noting that it must surpass that of the scribes and Pharisees. He discusses the relationship one should have with one’s brother, saying that there is much more to it than simply observing the Old Testament commandment not to kill. It is wrong even to be angry with one’s brother or to call him a fool. Furthermore, Jesus advises us that if we are not at peace with our brother, we should make peace with him before offering gifts to God.

In this teaching, Christ describes both justice and the interior dispositions that go even further in making one righteous. The cardinal virtue of justice, as St. Thomas Aquinas defines it, is the

 “habit whereby a man renders to each one his due by a constant and perpetual will.”

From this, we can draw out two of the chief characteristics of justice. The first is that it is concerned with other persons. It’s about giving to one distinct from oneself what he or she deserves. Secondly, justice is objective. It is primarily about the thing that is owed. It is not about what the other wants to receive or what you want to give. The commandment “Thou shalt not kill” regards justice, then, in its most proper form. It is a matter of showing due respect for the life God has given to the other man. Jesus gives other examples of unjust behavior to avoid. One owes respect not just to the life of the other but to his dignity as man as well, and so one ought not to disdain him by slandering or committing detraction against him. Christ goes even further than justice properly speaking (i.e., our outward actions) and addresses what can be called justice analogously. That is, he describes how to “be right” with oneself, and this is by overcoming one’s passions, such as anger.

 If this Gospel passage talks about establishing a just relation with our brother, what about our relationship with God?

We might be tempted to think that Lent is about merely establishing a just relationship between ourselves and him. Perhaps, for example, we think of the penances we undertake simply as a way of “repaying” God for dying on the Cross for us. It does indeed fall within the scope of justice to offer prayers and sacrifices to God, since we owe all we have and even our very existence to him. We can never really repay God fully, though, either for that existence or for the redemption he worked for us. So we can never have a truly just relationship with him in that sense.

Lent is not about evening things out with God. Since our prayers and sacrifices add nothing to God’s greatness or happiness, they are not primarily for his benefit, but rather for our own. Lent helps us recognize what we owe God, but even beyond that, it is about preparing for the celebration of Christ’s supreme act of charity in suffering his Passion and death for our salvation. The prayer and penances are a means to our growth in charity, which is achieved when obstacles between ourselves and God are removed. As Jesus notes in the Gospel, one of those obstacles often is a lack of peace with our brother.

 For “he who does not love his brother whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen” (1 John 4:20).

This Lent, may the charity of the Just Man fill us with longing for the kingdom of heaven and inspire us to imitate him.

 This article was written by Br. Joachim Kenney, O.P., who entered the Order of Preachers in 2010 and was found at the Word on Fire blog, used with permission. He is a graduate of the University of Louisville.

The Passion narratives of Matthew, Mark, and Luke rotate on a three-year cycle for Palm Sunday and this year the Church is presented with Mark’s narrative. Most scholars will agree that Mark’s narrative is the oldest of the four Passion narratives and that his Passion narrative is also the oldest part of the Gospel that is attributed to him. Mark’s narrative is notably dark. Jesus is surrounded by a growing darkness and will face ultimate abandonment from his friends and disciples and the feeling of ultimate separation from God the Father.

Mark’s Passion narrative has a prelude of two events. The first event is the unnamed woman who comes and anoints Jesus. Some have argued that this woman is Mary Magdalene but we do not know her identity. The second event is the Last Supper . While Mark recounts the institution of the Holy Eucharist, what is more poignant concerning the Passion narrative is Jesus’s prediction of Judas’s betrayal, which is followed by Jesus’s prediction of Peter’s denial and the scattering of the disciples, all of whom say it will never happen.

Following the time in the Upper Room, we find Jesus and his disciples in the Garden of Gethsemane. Here the Lord experiences the Agony in the Garden when faced with his impending suffering. As the darkness grows around him, Jesus finds Peter, James, and John asleep, the same disciples who witnesses his glory in the Transfiguration. But Jesus is resolute to the Father’s will and Judas comes and betrays Jesus with a kiss;

in the original Greek, this kiss (kataphilein) is understood as the kiss of a beloved, which lends even greater pain to Judas’s betrayal of Jesus.

The disciples flee. Jesus is left alone. We are given the peculiar detail of the young man who runs away naked. In stark contrast to the rich young man who could not part with his possessions to follow Jesus, this young man is willing to give up absolutely everything, even to the point of being naked, to get away from Jesus.

Jesus is led before the Sanhedrin and Pontius Pilate. Before the religious court, we see that the trial is a mockery and Mark demonstrates that the whole affair is a violation of Jewish law.

Before the elders, Jesus affirms that he is both Messiah and the Son of Man. Before Pilate, Jesus remains silent and resolute.

Pilate knows that the whole affair is a lie, but he lacked the courage to do what was right before the innocent Lord. The crowds choose Barabbas and Jesus is handed over to be scourged and crucified.

On the cross, the chief priests, the Roman soldiers, as well as those crucified with him, deride the Lord.

In this moment he experiences total abandonment.

When he cries out from the cross “my God, my God, why have you forsaken me,” it is response to a sense of total abandonment from the Father for, in his divine person, he is experiencing the damnation of the human race. The Father has not abandoned Jesus, but Jesus, though sinless, experiences the ultimate separation from God because of sin.

Jesus is buried, darkness covers the earth, and all seems lost, but, the greatest of all miracles is yet to come.

Father Christopher House is the Rector-Pastor of the Cathedral and serves in various leadership roles within the diocesan curia, specifically Chancellor and Vicar Judicial.

 In 1927, G.K. Chesterton penned an essay (h/t Fr. James Schall) for the Illustrated London News titled “Shakespeare and the Dark Lady.” An august scholar, the Comtesse de Chambrun, had written a heady, though insightful, book about William Shakespeare as an actor-poet. After considering her worthy contributions to the bottomless scholarly repository about Shakespeare, Chesterton admitted, “[This book] seems to me both fascinating and convincing. I hasten to say that the lady is very learned and I am very ignorant. I do not profess to know much about Shakespeare, outside such superficial trifling as the reading of his literary works.”

In another essay (“The Orthodoxy of Hamlet”), Chesterton was more pointed about the downside of being particularly refined and well-studied in that which is beautiful. Though he or she is often unaware, there are dangers in being an aesthete. “[Aesthetes] have goaded and jaded their artistic feelings too much to enjoy anything simply beautiful. They are aesthetes; and the definition of an aesthete is a man who is experienced enough to admire a good picture, but not inexperienced enough to see it.”

In his classic puckish and winsome way, G.K. Chesterton had, once again, brilliantly articulated an important distinction: the difference between analyzing something and engaging with it. It is the difference between efficiency and intentionality.

Efficiency is portrayed as the consummate modern virtue. Get up early, go to bed late, multi-task, double book, manage your time, juggle more. To race to the edge of a nervous breakdown without completely going over the edge is lauded like a noble act. Though your family feels abandoned, your health is in shambles, your faith is a memory, and your philosophy is cynical, you should be commended for getting everything done!

And efficiency isn’t solely about managing a schedule; as Chesterton pointed out, it is a way of thinking. Devoid of those pesky hangers-on like emotions and purpose and reflection, efficiency crowns those steely-eyed, decisive, ice-in-the-veins analysts. The cool ideal we are supposed to aspire to is the Navy Seal squinting at the cross-hairs, the neurosurgeon on the cusp of that vital incision, or the bomb squad preparing to cut the right wire. Efficiency. Cool, crisp, unencumbered. Just the facts, ma’am. We’re professionals here.

We’ve become masters of efficiency. But we’ve lost our soul. This isn’t who we are supposed to be.

Oh sure, we need to be objective, think clearly, be on time, and cultivate our expertise. But that is not all. We need to be human too. We are called to be quiet. We are creatures designed to reflect and reform. We need to still the buzzing of our phones and silence the jabbering of our televisions and just simply be. We have to wander, even get lost, so that our direction isn’t always our direction, but God’s. To paraphrase Ludwig Wittgenstein, we are not always to think; we are to look. We must cultivate an interiority of prayer, private thought, and contemplation, so we can more intentionally engage the world. As Romano Guardini once wrote, “Silence opens the inner fount from which the word arises.”

There’s a beautiful essay (“Morning Report”) written by an internal medicine resident physician, Sonia Singh, that I share with all of my medical students and residents. In it Singh characterizes, with stark accuracy, the furious race she runs every morning to see her list of hospitalized patients, write notes, order labs, answer pages, talk with nurses, and manage medical students (not to mention think) in order to get to her teaching conference (known as “Morning Report”). She describes the hurried conversations, the race up and down stairways, the blur of pages, the ticking of the clock. Finally, only moment s before she i s due in conference, she finds herself sitting on a bed next to a wizened veteran nurse (who is now a patient). After a warm exchange and a little teasing, they look at each other and realize that today the biopsy from the pancreatic mass will come back. They both know it won’t be good.

Looking at each other, with eyes welling up, they have a moment. Fleeting, almost intangible, but it is a moment. This frazzled resident and worried patient see, I mean really see, each other. It is a moment of deep humanity in this hell of efficiency. In it, the resident effectively says, I’m sorry and the patient says, I know. And then it was gone.

But it was there. And it was the most important moment in that resident’s day. Life requires efficiency. There is no question about that. But life is not efficiency itself. Rather, it is a million moments of deep intentionality that can be embraced—or carelessly overlooked.

Yes, today we live in a world where intentionality is a lost art. But it doesn’t have to be.

 Tod Worner is a husband, father, Catholic convert & practicing internal medicine physician. His blog, “Catholic Thinking”, is found at Aleteia.com. He also writes for Patheos (“A Catholic Thinker”) and the National Catholic Register. Follow him on Twitter @thinkercatholic.

In the Cathedral church you will find the or iginal high al tar underneath the great mosaic of the Immaculate Conception and the façades of the original two side altars beneath the mosaics of the Sacred Heart of Jesus and St. Joseph. The façades of all three altars are adorned with various symbols: the right side for St. Joseph, the left side for the Virgin Mary (in most churches the left altar was dedicated to her even though the mosaic is of Jesus), and the high altar for the Lord Jesus. On the far right of the high altar’s façade you will notice the symbol of a butterfly. Some among us may find this an odd choice of decoration but the symbol is very appropriate since the butterfly points to resurrection. A caterpillar is transformed through what is a “death,” essentially, into a beautiful new reality.

The Lord Jesus gives us the image of the grain of wheat in this Sunday’s Gospel reading, telling us: unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains just a grain of wheat; but if it dies, it produces much fruit. This image used by the Lord points to his own impending death and resurrection which the Church remembers as the Paschal Mystery.

This mystery [Paschal Mystery] is central to who we are as disciples because if we would live with the Lord we must also be willing to die with and for him.

This theme is not new for us, either in our shared life of faith nor in this year’s Lenten journey. Consider each of the Gospel selections that we have heard proclaimed during this holy season; each in their own way touch on the Paschal Mystery from dying to temptation to ultimate transfiguration through the Cross to allowing the temple of our own selves to be formed anew by Jesus to the grain of wheat that must die to itself to produce fruit.

While the butterfly on the high altar may be a somewhat hidden symbol to many, there are other things right in front of us all the time that point to this need to die to self that we may notice, such as the use of candles and flowers. When I was in the seminary, my instructors in liturgy always impressed on us the need to use wax candles and real flowers around the altar of sacrifice as small reminders of the Paschal Mystery as both of these die to themselves in order to give something: the candles diminish in order to give light and the cut flower is dying while giving the gift of its beauty. These are subtle but constant reminders for us to allow the power and grace of the Lord’s death and resurrection to work in our lives.

More than just looking for reminders of the Paschal Mystery, we are called to live it out each day in our own lives.

Discipleship calls us to die to self, to die to self-centered and self-seeking attitudes and behaviors.

This dying to self is accomplished through cooperating with the free gift of God’s grace made available to us through prayer, meditating on the Scriptures, good works, the Sacraments, and in other ways. Like the grain of wheat, when we cooperate with God’s grace and die to self, we are renewed and our truest selves are revealed. Let us seek the grace of God now and always to help us to die to ourselves and the old life of sin so that the Lord Jesus might raise us up and begin to transform us now into a new creation, the fullness of which is yet to be revealed.

Father Christopher House is the Rector-Pastor of the Cathedral and serves in various leadership roles within the diocesan curia, specifically Chancellor and Vicar Judicial.

 

The somewhat questionable consequences of smartphones, social media, and the many other technologies of their ilk have been well documented. A Psychology Today article, “How Technology is Changing the Way Children Think and Focus,” for example, had this to say about the societal effect of recent technologies: “Frequent exposure by so-called digital natives to technology is actually wiring their brain in ways very different than in previous generations.” Terms like “digital natives” and “wiring their brain” can sound vaguely ominous, maybe even apocalyptic. Of course, we could have said something similar about the baby boomers and the advent of their surrogate babysitters: television sets. And to be fair, such recent technologies also offer a lot of in the way of good for our world. Like most things in life, there are “pros” and “cons.”

If we survey the “cons,” the decrease in attention spans tends to be one of the biggest criticisms levied against the tide of technological progress. However, there is another burgeoning criticism that presents some grave implications. A recent article in The New York Times (“Stop Googling. Let’s Talk.”) explores a lesser-known drawback of recent technology: a diminished capacity for empathy. This is worth pausing over, since a society that loses its ability to empathize with others can quickly descend toward the inhumane. The article references a study conducted a few years ago by a team at the University of Michigan led by psychologist Sara Konrath. After reviewing 72 studies conducted over a 30-year period, they found that a “40 percent decline in empathy among college students, with most of the decline taking place after 2000.”

The author of the article, M.I.T. professor Sherry Turkle, goes on to affirm such findings, specifically among young children, by detailing her own experience of consulting with faculty at a private middle school.

“At a retreat, the dean described how a seventh grader had tried to exclude a classmate from a school social event. It’s an age-old problem, except that this time when the student was asked about her behavior, the dean reported that the girl didn’t have much to say: ‘She was almost robotic in her response. She said, “I don’t have feelings about this.” She couldn’t read the signals that the other student was hurt.’” The problem unfolds quite logically: if we can’t empathize with others, then we can’t as easily love them.

It’s worth mentioning that we can still will the good of others, and love them through acts of service even if we don’t “feel” for our neighbor, but it becomes harder to do so. (To be sure, there will always remain instances when we’re called to love without the feelings.) By cultivating a more empathetic worldview, we are making it easier to fulfill Christ’s command to heal the sick, set captives free, and spread the Gospel of life. There are times in the Gospel when we not only read about what Christ did to help others, but also about what he felt. Christ had “pity” on those suffering in his midst, which then moved him to loving action. The role that empathy plays is crucial, so any threat to our ability to “feel” for our suffering neighbor is worth taking seriously.

Many of us have been conditioned to rely on technology—be that our phones, laptops, or tablets—as a means of comfort, entertainment, information, and in the case of certain awkward social situations, escape. Honestly, when we’re eating dinner by ourselves in a restaurant, sitting on the bus alone, or waiting for a friend meeting us at a crowded venue, how many of us don’t rely on our phones to fill the empty space?

On certain days after work I head to a coffee shop to write. On those days I grab dinner somewhere quickly by myself. As I’m sitting alone at a table with a sandwich or salad in front of me, I feel the overwhelming compulsion to look at my phone. It feels strange not to be doing something and to just sit by myself, not listening to a podcast, talking on the phone, reading articles on my newsfeed, or doing anything else but eating.

Part of the reason it’s hard to sit alone is because it can be boring. I’ve conditioned myself to receive short rewards for looking at my phone. Each YouTube video, Facebook post, or email notification gives me something to chew on. I’m never bored because I have unmitigated access to something to entertain, inform, or engage me.But the less I’m able to sit in my own presence, the less I’m able to sit in another’s as well. As it turns out, being present to ourselves in the form of healthy solitude is similar to being present to our neighbor. If we can’t do one well, we can’t do the other well, either. Turkle unpacks this in her article:

“A VIRTUOUS circle links conversation to the capacity for selfreflection. When we are secure in ourselves, we are able to really hear what other people have to say. At the same time, conversation with other people, both in intimate settings and in larger social groups, leads us to become better at inner dialogue.”

There is tremendous irony in that often our gratuitous desire to connect with others, via social media for instance, can leave us more isolated. Our desire for connection is valid and worth honoring, but the best way to do this may be limiting time spent pursuing “digital connections” in order to create space for face-toface relationships.

There is something mysteriously sacramental about spending time with someone through in-person conversation devoid of expectation or distraction.

When we open ourselves up to relationships with others through our presence—and nothing else—we welcome a level of vulnerability, which can then lead to real and authentic connections. It’s hard to sit in the shared space with someone else and have ordinary, boring, and meandering conversation. There are awkward pauses, moments we don’t know what to say or how to respond, feelings of restlessness and impatience. This is often the case when we’re first getting to know someone, where we have to tread lightly across a plain of superficial and sometimes bland topics in order to set the groundwork to dig deeper. However, if we are talking to others while checking our phone, or thinking about checking our phone, then how can we ever get past that initial superficial level of getting to know someone, and therefore establish real, honest, and empathetic relationships?

Turkle mentions in her article that “the mere presence of a phone” in the periphery of two people in conversation influences what they talk about. With a phone present, two people will tend to only discuss things of which they are willing to endure interruption. It’s okay if the person across from me picks up their phone if I’m talking about a movie I saw or concert I attended over the weekend. However, I won’t risk talking about a struggling marriage, weakened faith, or deep yearning if I suspect that such vulnerability might be met with feigned nodding, eyes glued to a phone.

Not only does the undisciplined use of technology limit our ability to empathize and connect with another, but we ultimately miss out on experiencing God at a deeper level. For the more we enter the inner life of another—one created in the image and likeness of God—the more we come to know about the mystery of God. Charles Dickens wrote in his iconic A Tale of Two Cities that “every human creature is constituted to be that profound secret and mystery to every other.” By keeping our attention on the latest tweet or email alert, we miss out on something of infinitely more beauty and mystery: the person in front of us.

Chris Hazell is the founder of The Call Collective, a blog exploring the intersection between faith, culture and creativity. He holds bachelors’ degrees in English and Economics from UCLA and currently works as a Lead Content Strategist for Point Loma Nazarene University.

 

Growing up, I remember what seemed to be a more common sight than today when watching sports on television. It was not at all uncommon to see someone in the stands holding a sign that read “John 3:16.” The words of John 3:16 are given to us for this Fourth Sunday of Lent, Laetare Sunday. John is recounting for us a conversation between Jesus and Nicodemus. Nicodemus is a Pharisee and a respected member of the Sanhedrin. Later in John’s Gospel, Nicodemus will caution the elders not to rush to a hasty judgement concerning Jesus and his ministry without attempting to understand his words and actions.

Before Jesus expresses to Nicodemus the words that we have come to know from John 3:16, he implicitly centers the conversation on the impending mystery of the Cross. Jesus refers to an event concerning Moses and the Israelites that is recounted in the Book of Numbers. The people grumbled against God, so God sent poisonous seraph serpents into their camp causing many to die. Moses interceded on behalf of the people and God, in response, commanded Moses to fashion a bronze serpent and to erect it on a pole and anyone who looked at it would be healed of the poison of the serpents. This lifting up of the bronze serpent prefigures the lifting up of Jesus on the Cross so that whoever looks upon Jesus in faith will be saved from the poison of the original serpent given through the bite of the sin.

This brings us to one of the most beloved phrases in all of the Scriptures:

For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him might not perish but might have eternal life.

The concept of “the world” in the Gospels is many times equated with darkness and opposition to God, but we hear in this discourse from Jesus that, even though the world is covered in darkness and steeped in sin, God still loves the world. In the mystery of the Cross and Christ crucified we see God’s ultimate judgment on the world: not condemnation and wrath but love and mercy.

We must remember that this love and mercy are not irresistible. We must have hearts and lives that are open to receiving these gifts of God’s goodness. Jesus is the light that has come into the world and we must not be afraid to approach him.

The light that he gives exposes our sinfulness, but only so that we might confess it and choose his love and forgiveness as a remedy for it.

Sadly, there are many people who cannot bear the light, who are unwilling to acknowledge their own sinfulness and their need for a savior. They prefer to remain in the darkness with a false sense of fulfillment and happiness, neither of which can truly exist apart from a real and lasting relationship with God.

This Fourth Sunday of Lent is known as Laetare Sunday, a Latin command to rejoice! We are called to rejoice because our Lenten journey is now more than half over and the joy of Easter fast approaches. We are called to rejoice in the depth of God’s love for us which is fully revealed through the Passion, Death, and Resurrection of Jesus which we will soon commemorate. As we continue our Lenten journey, let us be mindful of why we are fasting, praying, and giving alms.

All of these practices should be responses of a heart that is grateful to God for the mercy that he has shown to us and marks of a desire for continued conversion.

Let us look upon Christ crucified with eyes of faith and hearts open to his saving grace. As with Moses and the seraph staff of old, so now with our crucified Lord: look with faith and live.

Father Christopher House is the Rector-Pastor of the Cathedral and serves in various leadership roles within the diocesan curia, specifically Chancellor and Vicar Judicial.

We are enhancing the stewardship offerings for your convenience. First, we often hear that parishioners wouldn’t mind contributing online, but would prefer something to still have to place in the basket. To that end, we are creating stewardship cards that you will be able to download and print from home or for pick up in the office. Secondly, we are working with the envelope company to add a checkbox on that back of the envelope that reads, “Please note my offertory gift was made online.” You could use your envelope to place in the basket, it would just be left empty. We hope these options will enhance your giving opportunities and make you feel comfortable with any decision you make. Please reach out to Katie Price, Stewardship Coordinator, by calling the Parish Offices or emailing [email protected]

If you are interested in signing up for electronic giving for your Sunday Offertory gifts or would like to make a donation to the Cathedral, please go to: https://spicathedral.org/give-online/

The season of Lent is a special time for Catholics. In almost every sphere of life, those who take something seriously come up with a plan. Championship sports teams, flourishing businesses, triumphant political campaigns and successful individuals all teach us a powerful lesson: Those who get results are generally the ones with better strategies implemented with perseverance.

That’s true, too, of the spiritual life, which is too important to wing. So much of our happiness, in this world and in the next, depends on whether we have a plan, whether it’s adequate to form us in holiness, and whether we make and keep the commitment to follow that plan. Lent is a time for Catholics to get back to the basics and make resolutions to prioritize what is truly important. We need to ensure, however, that our resolutions are commensurate to the task.

Pope Benedict used to stress that Lent is not about making minor course corrections in our lives, but about experiencing a radical and total conversion. It’s a moral exodus in which we give up the easy superficiality in which we live and resolve to adopt faithfully, step by step, Christ’s own path. It’s meant to be a Passover from mediocrity to sanctity; from being a part-time disciple to inserting ourselves fully into Christ’s paschal mystery; dying to ourselves so that Christ can truly live within us.

Lent, in short, is meant to help us recalibrate our entire existence and propel us toward becoming the Christians that our faith calls us to be. Our resolutions ought to reflect this. Will giving up candy for 40 days really make us holy? What about filling up a rice bowl with loose change or adding three extra Hail Marys at the end of the day? Such resolutions are, I think, equivalent to a professional athlete’s thinking he can train for the upcoming season by lifting five-pound barbells and watching Richard Simmons’ videos!

Lent, rather, is the “acceptable time” to get radical and put out into the deep, to overcome the temptation to become spiritual sissies in the resolutions we make, because if we’re wimps in the annual “spiritual boot camp” of Lent, then it’s almost impossible for us to have the spiritual discipline to live by Christ’s high standards throughout the rest of the year.

On Feb. 1, Pauline Books & Media published a book I wrote entitled, Plan of Life, in which I tried to give an overview of the training for holiness to which St. John Paul II challenged the Church in his pastoral plan for the third Christian millennium. It’s an adaption of what future priests receive in seminaries, religious are given during novitiate, and members of the more recent movements and ecclesiastically-approved institutions for lay faithful gain through their ongoing formation. It tries to cover everything from getting up to going to bed and making the most of the time in between.

At the beginning of Lent, we can focus on the basic Christian plan, what Jesus emphasizes for us every Ash Wednesday in the Gospel: praying, fasting and giving alms. In these practices of prayer, self-discipline and self-giving, Jesus summons us to follow him by imitating his bold example of praying and fasting in the desert for 40 days and nights and in giving himself to others to the last drop of his blood. Just as the devil tempted Adam and Eve in the Garden and Jesus in the desert, so he seeks to tempt us to disorder our relationship with ourselves, others and God.

Fasting, almsgiving and prayer are the respective antidotes. The more we fast and prioritize spiritual nourishment over material food, the less vulnerable we will be to being tempted by bread and earthly pleasures. The more we sacrifice ourselves and our belongings for others’ good, the less prone we will be to giving in to the devil’s seductions to seek power or control over them. The more we pray to God and hunger to know and do his will, the less assailable we will be to the devil’s trap presumptuously to force God’s hand.

Pope Benedict used to stress that Lent is not about mak ing minor cour se corrections in our lives, but about experiencing a radical and total conversion. In addition to being a great remedy against the seductions of the Evil One, these three traditional practices are also a great means to help us reorder our relationship to God, our neighbor and appetites.

First, prayer. If God is truly first in our lives, we will want to commit to making the loving dialogue with God our foremost priority. Rather than squeezing him into our day when we have time, we resolve to center our whole lives on him. Some Lenten resolutions to do this would be to come to daily Mass, “stay awake” with him in Gethsemane through Eucharistic adoration or a daily Holy Hour, pray the Stations of the Cross on Fridays, or try to attend a Lenten mission or retreat.

Second, fasting. Many of us, though believers, live like materialists, laboring harder to stock our refrigerators than to nourish ourselves spiritually.

Fasting helps us to say No to the devil’s temptations to prioritize our stomachs over our souls. It allows us to subordinate our bodily desires and needs to those of the Spirit, to control our desires rather than let them control us. The fast I ordinarily recommend is threefold: to drink mainly water throughout Lent, give up condiments on food (salt, pepper, sugar, butter, ketchup, salad dressing), and forsake sweets and snacks between meals. That’s a type of fast that not only is healthy, but at the end of 40 days will fill you with the discipline that it takes to be a disciple!

Third, almsgiving. Our biggest spiritual cancer often flows from selfishness or egocentrism. That is why the Lord commands us to give alms; to look toward others’ needs, not just our own; to love others in deeds and not just wish them well; and to take responsibility for others’ welfare, for as often as we fail to do something for them, we fail to care for Christ (Matthew 25:45).

How charitable should we be? We should try to give more than our surplus time or resources, but extend ourselves like the widow with her mite, something that will conform us to Christ’s standard of loving generosity. We should also be deliberate about our charity, not just engaging in “random acts of kindness,” but having a concerted game plan of self-sacrifice, just as Jesus had one toward us from before the world’s foundation.

Like baseball players have spring training to get back to the basics after a winter off, so Lent is the time for Christians to get back to the building blocks of a life built on Christ.

Championships often depend on the work done to form the habits that lead to greatness. Catholics would similarly profit from using Lent to jump-start the plan to form the habits that lead to virtue and ultimately to the eternal “Hall of Fame.”

Father Roger J. Landry is a priest of the Diocese of Fall River, Massachusetts, who works for the Holy See’s Permanent Observer Mission to the United Nations in New York. Father Landry is the national chaplain of Catholic Voices USA. His homilies are posted each week at saintanthonynewbedford.com and he is the author of Plan of Life: Habits to Help You Grow Closer to God.

I’m not big on jewelry, but one thing you might notice about me is that I always wear a crucifix around my neck. It is not a cross, but a crucifix. There is a reason for that. In fact, I want to share three reasons why I wear a crucifix.

Reason #1 — Remembrance: To Remember What True Love Looks Like

The crucifix is different than the cross. The cross is the instrument of torture with which Jesus was murdered, a particular favorite of the Roman Empire. The cross is the altar on which the Son of Man offered himself as an eternal sacrifice for the forgiveness of our sins. The cross is the new tree of life. The cross is significant, but only because of the time Jesus spent hanging from it.

For some people the cross is scandalous. It is something they hold to be in the past. As a Catholic I believe that the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross is eternal, and made ever-present at every Mass held everyday in every country around the world. “But we proclaim Christ crucified, a stumbling block for Jews and foolishness for Gentiles, but to those who are called, Jews and Greeks alike, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God” (1 Corinthians 1:23-24).

Don’t get me wrong. I know Jesus is not on the cross. He is not dead. He is risen. In fact: “A Catholic is one who believes that this Jesus remains alive, active, and accessible in and through His Church.” (Archbishop Timothy Cardinal Dolan)

Jesus on the cross is what matters. It is the ultimate act of God’s love for us. To gaze upon the crucifix, for me, is to look upon love in its most perfect expression. In the busyness of my daily life I need to be reminded of that, and reminded often. The crucifix around my neck serves as a reminder of God’s love for the world, but particularly God’s love for me.

Reason #2 — Inspiration: To Inspire Me to Take Up My Cross Daily

The crucifix might be thought of as a gruesome sight. However, for me it is inspiring. To see Jesus on the cross is a reminder of the challenge he made to his disciples—the challenge he makes to me. “If anyone wishes to come after me, he must deny himself take up his cross daily and follow me” (Luke 9:23).

It’s not a suggestion or a good idea; it is the condition of discipleship. To be a disciple is to make your life about this challenge. And believe you me, it is a challenge. This is why I need to be inspired. This is why I like to contemplate the image of Christ crucified: not because I enjoy seeing him broken and bloody, but because I know those are the footsteps in which I must follow.

As a Christian I know I am called to be a martyr—a witness. Who I am in life and in death must bear witness to Christ. Whether that means I will literally lay down my life for him, I cannot be certain. But come what may, the challenge made to we disciples is just that: to accept the pain and suffering that can and will come our way because of our free decision to follow Jesus.

“Blessed are they who are persecuted for the sake of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 5:10). Seeing Jesus on the cross is an inspirational example that I am called to follow, and this is another reason for the crucifix around my neck.

Reason #3 — Accountability: So Others Will Hold Me Accountable as a Christian

The last reason I wear a crucifix is for accountability. It is not jewelry. It is not meant to be flashy. But I do want others to see it. It’s not because I want them to think I am super holy. (Although I should be striving for holiness; after all, that is the call we share as Christians.) I wear a crucifix so that others may know that I am a Christian and hold me accountable to that claim. For it is one thing to tell people you are a Christian and another to show them that you are. I want to be treated differently because of my faith. I want people to know that I live my life differently than most. When they know this, they will expect me to. And if I don’t, then I need to be called out for it.

Accountability is important. Fraternal correction is essential. We shouldn’t be able to parade around claiming to be new creations in Christ, but living lives that don’t follow suit. And the crucifix I wear is the perfect symbol of my faith that tells all those who encounter me that I am a Christian and take my faith seriously.

I can’t wear the crucifix and then deny my faith. It would cause scandal. People would notice. So it is the perfect way to invite others to challenge me to live my faith.

There may be other methods of achieving each of these three things shared here, but for me the crucifix is the best. If you wear a crucifix but don’t know why, then I hope these reflections have served to help you understand this practice on a deeper level. If you aren’t Catholic and always wondered why the crucifix is held in such high esteem among Catholics, then hopefully this explains it.

May the sacrifice of Christ on the cross bring the power of God’s love and mercy into each of our lives, that we may “proclaim Christ crucified” (1 Corinthians 1:23) and “make disciples of all nations” (Matthew 28:19).

A convert to Catholicism, Ricky Jones came into the Church in 2008 and has served as a catechist and parish leader. He blogs about faith at LeadersThatFollow.com. He is the author of Seven Lessons in Leading People to Life Change, a practical guide for living your faith, leading people into relationship with God, and building up the Church.

Almsgiving is more than just allocating surplus funds to a charitable organization or cause. More is expected of us than that! Think of almsgiving as acts of generosity that enable the performance of the corporal and spiritual works of mercy. It is through the corporal and spiritual works of mercy that we show ourselves to be faithful, rather than accidental, disciples.

Ours is an age of scandals, and one of the great scandals that has become a stumbling block to so many in terms of the faith is that too many of the faithful have come to believe that the performance of the works of mercy is a matter of delegation. We make the works of mercy works for hire and exempt ourselves from having to actually do them ourselves. Not so! The works of mercy cannot be delegated. We each have to do them, and it is through our participation in the works of mercy that almsgiving is fulfilled.

Almsgiving places a demand on us to receive Christ as he presents himself to us in his poor.

Almsgiving places a demand on us to receive Christ as he presents himself to us in his poor. This can be an off-putting experience because Christ arrives in his poor on his own terms. Our place, once he makes his presence known, is not to control, but to serve. And as in his poor Christ takes the lowest place, we are compelled to take our place beneath him as servants of the One who makes himself a slave. The performance of such service often resists offering to us the kinds of consolations that we might expect from our service to the Lord, but it is precisely in this that our service becomes efficacious. We learn from this experience how to imitate Christ’s generosity, who gave to us fully knowing that what he gave was undeserved, could not be reciprocated, and would be unappreciated by many. It is in imitation of Christ’s service and acceptance of his conditions that our own service is perfected.

Almsgiving is also a reminder of our own mortality, inasmuch as all worldly goods will be surrendered at the moment of death. Rather than building ever greater storehouses for our possessions, we give what we have away. That we do so incrementally prepares us for the surrender of all worldly goods that will ultimately come.

Prayer. Fasting. Almsgiving. None of these are ends in themselves. Instead, each is a way, a way that is opening us up to the Church’s spiritual passage into the great mysteries of Holy Week:

“Remember, thou art dust And shall to dust return: Then place not in the world thy trust, Its delusions spurn; Prepare thee for the mighty change Impending over all; Give to thy thoughts a loftier range And heed Heaven’s call.”

(J. Beste, nineteenth century)

This is an excerpt from an article titled, “How to Get Ready for Lent” by Fr. Steve Grunow, CEO of Word on Fire Catholic Ministries. The article can be found at the Word on Fire Blog, wordonfire.org.