We are almost at the end of Lent. As disciples, we are invited to dedicate our lives to the mission of announcing the hope and communicating the love of life, that is the glory of God. The “law on the heart”, announced by Jeremiah, is the commandment of love communicated by Jesus, that unites all and brings peace.
We are in the final days of this time of grace for those that may know to welcome the invitation of God in considering the”health” of the interior life. Grace of the same form, for all the community, for with certainty, many of us took seriously the proposal to cultivate the interior life from the Gospel, that indicates a mentality and a mode of living and living with others. It is, therefore, a special celebration in the send that we are invited to seal, to sign this commitment of cultivating the interior live in the perspective of the Gospel.
It is the hour to ask ourselves: “To what point do we assume the promise of living as Christians? To what point are we committed to the divine plan of putting the Spirit of God among us through the fulfillment of the Kingdom project.
In what do you put your heart? With whom do you establish relationships? To make a covenant with God and living according to the divine project made with our relationships may be firm and lasting, for it is an alliance signed with life, with that which represents the centrality of it: the loving heart of God the Father.
To be unfaithful to this union is the same as to “tatter” life, waste it, lose it, as Jesus says in the Gospel: “Whomever wants to gain life is going to lose it.” Whomever wants to put in their heart, another project that is not of God, will lose the sense of living. It is for this that before we initiate the celebration, we make the act of penance.
Putting God in the heart, in the center of our personal existence, is not the easy work for any of us. In our days, the situations may appear more confused than others. We are like those that were with Jesus and heard the divine voice, but they did not know to identify it, feeling that it was the voice of angels, thunder or something else. There are so many voices that speak and end confusing us instead of helping us identify God’s plan.
It is necessary to consider the response of that Jesus gave to the Greeks, those that wanted to see the Lord, to understand well the sense of “putting God as the center of our interior life.” If those Greeks wanted to see “the famous”, “miracle worker” or “preacher” Jesus, they would have a great disappointment!
Jesus speaks of the demand of the Divine plan, the point of having to die to live differently. This demands detachment from this life, assuming the mentality of the Gospel, or maybe, taking for oneself, a demanding promise and it is only realized by those that have the Spirit of God within them.
The Plan of God was fully realized by Jesus. Today, it still continues to be realized by the disciples of Christ that have the Holy Spirit in their hearts, for those that take seriously the covenant on the day of their baptism, also those that are not Christians “in name”, but assume the mentality of the Gospel and make of their way of living and acting.
I end with the following questions: What is in the center of your interior life? Which thing is more important that is in your heart? The Spirit of God or another mentality adjusted for this world? We are going to think of this during the week, to taking a sincere decision of our way of being Christian at the beginning of Holy Week.
Lent is the time of preparation for Easter. There are two fundamental attitudes of this time for you and for me: The conversion of the heart and the solidarity with the poor. the prayer is the best medium to lead us to this road.
Father Bantu Mendonça
Fr. Bantu Mendonça Katchipwi Sayla is a priest for the Diocese of Tubarão, Angola
Translated from Portuguese