Then we won't have regrets!

I had been thinking about how to live Lent this year, ready to get going, thinking of it a month before it arrived!

Why mention that?  Let's put it this way, I was not always ready to meet Lent head-to-head.  It's that Cross stuff, you know!  Suffering and for what?

Well, I've been going through some suffering--emotional and physical--and now I realize that one needs to accept what one cannot change.  To have the courage to change what one can (like someone hunger), serenity to accept the things one cannot (that one gets hunger daily), and wisdom to know the difference.  

During Lent, I can work on serenity and on courage.

I used to really get frustrated in college that Holy Week was during Spring Break.  Why did I have to be in the church full days when others were at the beach?  Alright, didn't I already do this last year?  I remember that He died for me.

Now I know that I DO NOT remember He died for me.  It is a constant gift, at each Mass, giving Himself to God the Father to intercede for us.  He doesn't complain that He did it yesterday and the
day before, just as a woman in love doesn't complain she did a loving kindness yesterday and the day before, so why again today?!

Some show up at church twice a year: Christmas and Easter. That is enough, right?  The rest of the year, they can handle things on their own.  We can handle our lives, right?  We have the serenity and courage on our own, right?  Yes, I do forget that everything we have, even the serenity and courage, come from Him.  He calls us to Himself, not to tolerate us, but to love us profoundly, in the midst of our temptations, dreams, and battles.

Life is a constant battle of choosing the good over the bad, of living just the way I want to and of living the way that will really bring me joy and fulfillment.  Lent helps me find my way back to knowing what is really good, what joy really is.  I find my way back to God.

Back to the Check-in-twice-a-year style:  it acknowledges Christ's Birth and Christ's Death.  Christmas and Easter are such huge days that "Christmas Day" and "Easter Day" actually cover a period of nine days and into Christmastide and Eastertide for about forty more days of reflection on the Birth and the Death of our Redeemer.  

We get ready for those times with time before it.  In the end, we will realize that we were living our Forty-Years-in-the-Desert during our lifetimes, always lead by Him, always getting ready for the time when we will see God face to face!  For He is indeed, the Promised Land!  He leads us in the Eucharist so we may "see" Him this side of Heaven.  The desert is hard... that's true.  Drink often of His Ways to not get parched and lukewarm, dehydrated and in survival mode.  It makes you stronger in dealing with life.

 In the desert, He is the Living Water; we won't complain the times we thought of Him, drank Him in, dwelt on Him, over and over again.  Blessed Lent!