Beginning Our Lenten Journey

Dear Friends,
A special hello to everybody as we begin our journey through Lent together.
Last Wednesday we made a statement about that journey when as a Christian Community we marked ourselves with ashes and so said we would embark on this ‘journey of penance’ for the next forty days.
In the gospel today we also find Jesus embarking on a journey through the desert that lasts forty days. Like us, he is tempted by the Devil but unlike us he does not give in to temptation.
Bishop. Dennis Nulty (Kildare & Leighlin), writing in Intercom Magazine puts it, I think, very well:
“Old Nick and the Angel Mick are side by side in these few verses from St. Mark’s Gospel. A rare appearance with Jesus, but perhaps more like the story of most of our lives – the good and the bad side by side. Would Jesus fall for ‘old Nick’s tricks’? Hardly! His strength, his prayer, his remaining in the desert, undid the weakness of Adam and Eve. His staying the course gives us all a second bite at the apple. For most it’s not enough – we need a third, fourth, fifth – to overcome the kind of world that led Noah (in today’s first reading) to build the Ark and preserve his family, stock and goods. The Noah we meet is post flood. He is starting again, this time on a better footing in ‘covenant’ with God.”
Lent gives us the opportunity to start again. It allows us to sort out the good and the bad in our lives. Mind you, on our journey we should heed the one whose journey we’re shadowing and keep an eye out for ‘Old Nick’.”
So what am I doing for Lent as penance for my sins? What are you doing? In this little piece I’m not going to answer that question for myself or for you. It is a matter between me and God – you and God. But for God’s sake do something – AND BEGIN NOW.
I hope your First Week of Lent goes well for you.