On the first Sunday of Lent, the diocese always celebrates the Rite of Election, a ceremony in which those preparing for Baptism at the Easter Vigil come to the Cathedral to be received by the Bishop and given a new designation as the Elect, those who have been chosen by the Church to receive these sacraments. I am pleased to report that we have five members of the Elect who will be baptized here at the Easter Vigil. Looking through our parish Book of the Elect which lists the names of those to be baptized each year, the last time we had this number was ten years ago! This is a great sign of hope for our parish and for the diocese, which has experienced increased numbers over the past two years. Please keep our Elect in your prayers: Tony, Mike, Reece, Grace, and Ava.
An important part of Lent for these Elect are the three Scrutinies that take place on the 3rd, 4th, and 5th Sundays of Lent. The Order of Christian Initiation of Adults describes these three Scrutinies in this way:
In order to awaken a desire for purification and redemption by Christ, three Scrutinies take place, both to teach the elect gradually about that mystery of sin from which the whole world and every person longs to be rescued in order to be saved from its present and future consequences, and to fill their spirit with the sense of Christ the Redeemer, who is living water (cf. the Gospel of the Samaritan Woman), light (cf. the Gospel of the Man Born Blind), resurrection and life (cf. the Gospel of the Raising of Lazarus). From the first to the final Scrutiny, they must grow in the awareness of sin and in the desire for salvation. (OCIA, 143)
Given that the first Scrutiny that takes place this weekend points to Jesus as the Living Water, the invocation that I have chosen for this week is the following:
Heart of Jesus, fountain of life and holiness, have mercy on us.
Throughout the dialog with the Samaritan Woman, Jesus is leading her toward a deeper understanding of what He desires to offer to her, not just physical water that will temporarily satisfy her thirst, but a water that will well up to Eternal Life. (cf. Jn 4:13-14) There is an often-overlooked detail in the account that is worth mentioning. After Jesus offers this living water to her, she departs and we read: “The woman left her water jar.” (Jn 4:28) St. Thomas Aquinas comments on this detail in the following way:
The water jar is a symbol of worldly desires, by which men draw out pleasures from the depths of darkness—symbolized by the well—i.e., from a worldly manner of life. Accordingly, those who abandon worldly desires for the sake of God leave their water jars (Thomas Aquinas, Commentary on the Gospel of John: Chapters 1–21, trans. Fabian Larcher and James A. Weisheipl, vol. 1 (Washington, DC: The Catholic University of America Press, 2010), 229)
This is what our Elect are being invited to at the Easter Vigil. As they receive Jesus in the fount of Baptism, they receive a new life in which they are cleansed of their sins, characterized by worldly desires, and they are equipped to live new lives of holiness as they pursue the life of the Gospel and the goods of Eternal Life.
May our Lenten journey also be a time in which we recall our Baptism and the invitation from Christ to continue to turn to His Heart, the fountain of life, to help us in our daily struggle to turn away from worldly desires and recommit to living lives of holiness.