LENTEN SEASON
Ash Wednesday is the beginning of Lent. The Catholic Church holds special services at which the worshippers are marked with ashes as a symbol of death, and sorrow for sins. The marking of our forehead with a cross made of ashes reminds us that: death comes to everyone... we should be sad for our sins... we must change ourselves for the better... change our basic orientation and renew our baptismal promises.
Ash Wednesday is a clear call to conversion, to that movement away from sin and toward Christ that we have to embrace over and over again through our lives.
Failure to recognize my guilt, the illusion of my innocence, does not justify me and does not save me, because I am culpable for the numbness of my conscience and my incapacity to recognize the evil in me for what it is.
My encounter with God awakens my conscience in such a way that it no longer aims at self-justification, but it becomes a capacity for listening to the Good itself.
Sinners enter the Kingdom before the self-righteous who see no need for repentance.
Let us examine how faithful and obedient we have been as God’s children.Let us then ask forgiveness for our sins of action and omission.
May God have mercy on us and forgive us our sins. Amen