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DTSTART;VALUE=DATE:20250324
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SUMMARY:Vigils Reading
DESCRIPTION:A SEASON OF HEALING \nBy Thomas Merton2 \n◊◊◊ \nThe Paschal Mystery is above all the mystery of life\, in which the Church\, \nby celebrating the death and resurrection of Christ\, enters into the Kingdom of \nLife which He has established once for all by His definitive victory over sin and \ndeath… Lent is then not a season of punishment so much as one of healing. \nThere is joy in the salutary fasting and abstinence of the Christian who \neats and drinks less in order that his mind may be more clear and receptive to \nreceive the sacred nourishment of God’s word\, which the whole Church \nannounces and meditates upon in each day’s liturgy throughout Lent. The \nwhole life and teaching of Christ pass before us\, and Lent is a season of special \nreflection and prayer\, a forty-day retreat in which each Christian\, to the extent \nhe is able\, tries to follow Christ into the desert by prayer and fasting… \nIn this way\, for the whole Church\, Lent will not be merely a season simply \nof a few formalized penitential practices\, half understood and undertaken \nwithout interest\, but a time of metanoia\, the turning of all minds and hearts to \nGod in preparation for the celebration of the Paschal Mystery… \nIt is a time in which joy and grief go together hand in hand: for that is the \nmeaning of compunction – a sorrow which pierces\, which liberates\, which gives \nhope and therefore joy. Such sorrow brings joy because it is at once a mature \nacknowledgment of guilt and the acceptance of its full consequences: hence it \nimplies a religious and moral adjustment to reality\, the acceptance of one’s \nactual condition\, and the acceptance of reality is always a liberation from the \nburden of illusion which we strive to justify by our errors and sins. Compunction \nis a necessary sorrow\, but it is followed by joy and relief because it wins for us \none of the greatest blessings: the light of truth and the grace of humility. \nOnly the inner rending\, the tearing of the heart\, brings this joy. It lets out \nour sins\, and lets in the clean air of God’s spring\, the sunlight of the days that \nadvance toward Easter. Rending of the garments lets in nothing but the cold. \nThe rending of the heart which is spoken of in Joel is that “tearing away” from \nourselves and our <oldness> – the “oldness” of the old man\, wearied with the \nboredom and drudgery of an indifferent existence\, that we may turn to God and \ntaste His mercy\, in the liberty of His sons and daughters. \nWhen we turn to Him\, what do we find? That “He is gracious and \nmerciful\, patient and rich of mercy”…The purpose of Lent is…above all a \npreparation to rejoice in His love. And this preparation consists in receiving the \ngift of His mercy – a gift which we receive in so far as we open our hearts to it\, \ncasting out what cannot remain in the same room with mercy. \nNow one of the things we must cast out first of all is fear. Fear narrows the \nlittle entrance of our heart. It shrinks up our capacity to love. It freezes up our \npower to give ourselves. If we were terrified of God as an inexorable judge\, we \nwould not confidently await His mercy\, or approach Him trustfully in prayer. \nOur peace\, our joy in Lent are a guarantee of grace. \n2 Seasons of Celebration – Farrar\, Straus & Giroux – NY – 1965 – pg. 113f.5
URL:https://laycisterciansofgethsemani.org/event/vigils-reading-282/
CATEGORIES:Vigils Readings
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