Re-reading the Pope's Message for Lent

With the Lenten season officially beginning this week on Ash Wednesday, we take a look at the Pope’s thoughts for this period in which Catholics are called to prepare for Easter through prayer, fasting and good works. And what better way than to review his Message for Lent 2012?

The four page message offers a reflection on what the Pope calls “the very heart of Christian life: charity.” And the Lenten season is “a favourable time to renew our journey of faith, both as individuals and as a community, with the help of the word of God and the sacraments. This journey is one marked by prayer and sharing, silence and fasting, in anticipation of the joy of Easter.”

The theme for this year’s Lenten message is a brief biblical passage drawn from the Letter to the Hebrews: “Let us be concerned for each other, to stir a response in love and good works”.

“These words are part of a passage in which the sacred author exhorts us to trust in Jesus Christ as the High Priest who has won us forgiveness and opened up a pathway to God. Embracing Christ bears fruit in a life structured by the three theological virtues: it means approaching the Lord “sincere in heart and filled with faith” (v. 22), keeping firm “in the hope we profess” (v. 23) and ever mindful of living a life of “love and good works.”

To sustain this life shaped by the Gospel, the message reads, it is important to participate in the liturgy and community prayer. And the passage from the Letter to the Hebrews “offers a succinct, valuable and ever timely teaching on the three aspects of Christian life: concern for others, reciprocity and personal holiness.”

The message looks at each of these in turn, reflecting first on “Let us be concerned for each other”: responsibility towards our brothers and sisters.”

The first aspect is an invitation to be “concerned” – a verb coming from the Greek term katanoein which means to scrutinize, to be attentive, to observe carefully and take stock of something.

“The verb which introduces our exhortation tells us to look at others, first of all at Jesus, to be concerned for one another, and not to remain isolated and indifferent to the fate of our brothers and sisters. All too often, however, our attitude is just the opposite: an indifference and disinterest born of selfishness and masked as a respect for “privacy”. Today too, the Lord’s voice summons all of us to be concerned for one another. Even today God asks us to be “guardians” of our brothers and sisters (Gen 4:9), to establish relationships based on mutual consideration and attentiveness to the well-being, the integral well-being of others. The great commandment of love for one another demands that we acknowledge our responsibility towards those who, like ourselves, are creatures and children of God.”

“If we cultivate this way of seeing others as our brothers and sisters,” the Pope writes, “solidarity, justice, mercy and compassion will naturally well up in our hearts.”

“The Servant of God Pope Paul VI stated that the world today is suffering above all from a lack of brotherhood: “Human society is sorely ill. The cause is not so much the depletion of natural resources, nor their monopolistic control by a privileged few; it is rather the weakening of brotherly ties between individuals and nations” (Populorum Progressio, 66).

The message stresses that “concern for others entails desiring what is good for them from every point of view: physical, moral and spiritual.”

“Contemporary culture seems to have lost the sense of good and evil, yet there is a real need to reaffirm that good does exist and will prevail, because God is “generous and acts generously” (Ps 119:68). The good is whatever gives, protects and promotes life, brotherhood and communion.”

“Responsibility towards others thus means desiring and working for the good of others, in the hope that they too will become receptive to goodness and its demands” the message reads. And, the Pope warns us “of the danger that our hearts can become hardened by a sort of “spiritual anesthesia” which numbs us to the suffering of others.”

By way of illustration, the message points to the parable of the Good Samaritan in which the priest and the Levite “pass by”, indifferent to the presence of the man stripped and beaten by the robbers and to the story of a starving Lazarus who is ignored by the rich man. Both parables are examples of “the opposite of ‘being concerned,’ of looking upon others with love and compassion.”

“What hinders this humane and loving gaze towards our brothers and sisters? Often it is the possession of material riches and a sense of sufficiency, but it can also be the tendency to put our own interests and problems above all else. We should never be incapable of “showing mercy” towards those who suffer. Our hearts should never be so wrapped up in our affairs and problems that they fail to hear the cry of the poor” the Pope writes.

“Reaching out to others and opening our hearts to their needs,” Pope Benedict says, “can become an opportunity for salvation and blessedness.”

“Being concerned for each other” the Pope explains, “also entails being concerned for their spiritual well-being” and the Holy Father reflects on one aspect of Christian life which he believes “has been quite forgotten: fraternal correction in view of eternal salvation.”

While today people are generally sensitive to the idea of charity and caring about the physical and material well-being of others, the Pope continues, we are “almost completely silent about our spiritual responsibility towards our brothers and sisters.”

Pope Benedict points to the early Church and “those communities that are truly mature in faith…which are concerned not only for the physical health of their brothers and sisters, but also for their spiritual health and ultimate destiny” as examples for true Christians to follow. And he reminds us that Christians have “the prophetic mission…to speak out against a generation indulging in evil.”

“We must not remain silent before evil. I am thinking of all those Christians who, out of human regard or purely personal convenience, adapt to the prevailing mentality, rather than warning their brothers and sisters against ways of thinking and acting that are contrary to the truth and that do not follow the path of goodness. Christian admonishment, for its part, is never motivated by a spirit of accusation or recrimination. It is always moved by love and mercy, and springs from genuine concern for the good of the other.”

“In a world pervaded by individualism,” the Pope writes, “it is essential to rediscover the importance of fraternal correction, so that together we may journey towards holiness.”

Then the Pope speaks of the second aspect of Christian charity: “Being concerned for each other”: the gift of reciprocity.”

“A society like ours can become blind to physical sufferings and to the spiritual and moral demands of life. This must not be the case in the Christian community! The Apostle Paul encourages us to seek “the ways which lead to peace and the ways in which we can support one another” (Rom 14:19) for our neighbour’s good, “so that we support one another” (15:2), seeking not personal gain but rather “the advantage of everybody else, so that they may be saved” (1 Cor 10:33). This mutual correction and encouragement in a spirit of humility and charity must be part of the life of the Christian community.”

We are united to others in “a profound aspect of communion: our existence is related to that of others, for better or for worse” the Pope writes, affirming that the destiny and salvation of others directly affects our own.

“Acts of charity towards our brothers and sisters – as expressed by almsgiving, a practice which, together with prayer and fasting, is typical of Lent – is rooted in this common belonging. Christians can also express their membership in the one body which is the Church through concrete concern for the poorest of the poor.”

Finally, Pope Benedict reflects on the third aspect of Christian life: “To stir a response in love and good works”: walking together in holiness.”

Here, the Pope says “being concerned for one another should spur us to an increasingly effective love” – something which is “particularly pressing in this holy season of preparation for Easter.”

“The time granted us in this life is precious for discerning and performing good works in the love of God…Sadly, there is always the temptation to become lukewarm, to quench the Spirit, to refuse to invest the talents we have received, for our own good and for the good of others…let us accept the invitation, today as timely as ever, to aim for the “high standard of ordinary Christian living” (Novo Millennio Ineunte, 31). The wisdom of the Church in recognizing and proclaiming certain outstanding Christians as Blessed and as Saints is also meant to inspire others to imitate their virtues…In a world which demands of Christians a renewed witness of love and fidelity to the Lord, may all of us feel the urgent need to anticipate one another in charity, service and good works.”
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