[In the United States the tradition of Mardi Gras is the Tuesday before Ash Wednesday. In Portuguese speaking countries such as Brazil it is called Carnaval. There is a saying “Vai Pular o Carnaval?” Which translates literally are you going to jump Carnaval but means are you going to party at Carnaval. The author uses the jumping image in terms of the literal translation in light of the figurative translation throughout this piece.-ed.]
Are you going to jump Carnaval? or Let’s go to jump Carnaval?
If you have not heard one of these questions, I say to you: I doubt that you will arrive at Ash Wednesday without hearing at least one of the two questions! Perhaps two hundred times…lol.
There are people that are going to jump until until their legs hurt and ending well below where they began: in the gutter. There are people that want to skip carnaval, doing other things, pretending that it does not exist and wake right up in Lent. In the second category there are those that are going to a spiritual retreat and those that simply that are going to enjoy the family “far from the mess”.
I don’t know where you fit…(maybe a little of both, going to a club, having bar-b-que with family, attending preaching at a Canção Nova mission house, going to mass on Sunday and leaving for “I don’t know what” on Tuesday) Believing that you are big enough to know what to do, where to do it and how to do it. I am not going to give tips of Carnaval, I am going to pose only one question: What is the objective of your choice.
Have you thought of this?
You may be at the beach, in the park, reading a book, losing your dignity, being more or less “of God”,what brings you to this? The motivation is it internal or superficial? Yeah, doing something because you are motivated or because you are “just going along”?
It is the hour that people jump higher, even higher! It is in the hour of jumping not 3 or 10 centimeters and returning immediately to the ground, but to jump to an infinite level, to eternity! And not to arrive there with a jump alone, but at least to know that you are not going to turn back and crash on the ground.
The first jump is this, to know where you are going and why you are going! You know? Beginning by giving all you can in prayer because it has meaning. We need to jump in search of meaning. Again all I emphasize even annoyingly, ALL that people do that does not have meaning is losing real time/eternity. If you don’t like it, your feeling will be a sacrifice, if you like it, the meaning can be something else, but it has to exist.
As Don Bosco said, you can run, jump and scream at will, only if it is not for sinning!
Who knows what you do, why you do it, know that doing all things and only stopping to do them when we want brings us to sin. Who knows what you do and why you are doing something. . . in essence all things are good but if not for growing in holiness none of them would have any real value.
Are we going to jump higher? If not for being Holy, it is worthless.
translated from Portuguese