The symbolism and what the 'desert' represents has a special significance in our Christian spirituality especially during the season of Lent. Throughout human history, there are impulses of greatness’s that sprung from the desert. The great monastic spirituality has also sprung from the solitude of the desert. Such solitude, according to the monks and hermits of the desert is a battlefield.
This First Sunday of Lent, our Lord Jesus, who submitted Himself to the Will of the Father by contemplating His mission when He withdrew into the desert for 40 days. In the wilderness, confronted with the reality of good and evil, Jesus has to be stripped of all the forms of comfort and support in order to enter into the conflict of humanity so that He, as the Lord and Savior, can save and redeem humanity.
Lent is a time when we, as Christ's followers, go into the desert with Him: to share His conflict and His glory, to understand our own weakness, to shun temptations away and to evaluate the depth of our reliance on God's grace - all of these is our path to personal conversion, which in most part, is the goal of our Lenten resolution.
I invite all of you to make the most of our Lenten journey together. Our parish community will be preparing different activities throughout this season of Lent as to provide venues for recollection and reflection on our Christian faith. We will create an atmosphere of prayer in order to help us enter the solitude of the desert within our heart.
Let us ask the prayer of our Blessed Mother so that we could truly journey with her Son in realizing our own mission. May the example of Mary, the first and greatest disciple of Jesus, teach us how to strip ourselves of pride as a way of penance this Lenten season.
This First Sunday of Lent, our Lord Jesus, who submitted Himself to the Will of the Father by contemplating His mission when He withdrew into the desert for 40 days. In the wilderness, confronted with the reality of good and evil, Jesus has to be stripped of all the forms of comfort and support in order to enter into the conflict of humanity so that He, as the Lord and Savior, can save and redeem humanity.
Lent is a time when we, as Christ's followers, go into the desert with Him: to share His conflict and His glory, to understand our own weakness, to shun temptations away and to evaluate the depth of our reliance on God's grace - all of these is our path to personal conversion, which in most part, is the goal of our Lenten resolution.
I invite all of you to make the most of our Lenten journey together. Our parish community will be preparing different activities throughout this season of Lent as to provide venues for recollection and reflection on our Christian faith. We will create an atmosphere of prayer in order to help us enter the solitude of the desert within our heart.
Let us ask the prayer of our Blessed Mother so that we could truly journey with her Son in realizing our own mission. May the example of Mary, the first and greatest disciple of Jesus, teach us how to strip ourselves of pride as a way of penance this Lenten season.
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