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          Another of the three pillars of Lent is almsgiving.  Christians are taught that generosity is the norm in dealing with others. The first reason for this is that we consider everything is a gift from God, therefore we are simply stewards of what we possess. The second reason is that since love requires more than a thought but real action, then we must share with others not only from our abundance, but our sustenance. For some it is difficult to give and for others it is difficult to receive, but we are commanded to do both in joy.

      As prayer deals with our relationship with God, so almsgiving deals with our relationship with others. One of the things I sincerely believe is that the only way to get to heaven is together, to help others and allow ourselves to be helped. We go to hell all by ourselves and that hell begins on earth. Generosity moves us out of ourselves, while selfishness moves us inward. Almsgiving is not just offering financial or materials resources, but also time in listening to and helping others, because there are poor spiritually or metionally as well as those who our poor materially. The material almsgiving can be easier becuase it is often parting with material wealth, spiritual almsgiving is is need in this lonely world, where people are most and more isolated from true human communication, which is more than simply facebook status reports.

   Almsgiving  reminds us that we are connected to each other and we need each other. If someone wishes to help you today, allow them to give their alms, even is it seems to some insignificant, it will help you. Also, do not forget to reach out today to someone in need, especially those in spiritual need of hope, love and compassion.

     On this first Sunday of Lent, we hear the story of the temptation of Jesus Christ in the wilderness and as well as the Fall of Adam and Eve in the Book of Genesis. It is clear form both that the battle ground for souls is in our free will. what we lost through our free will is regained by the human free will of Jesus Christ.

      The devil plays the human race like a cheap fiddle. He knows that the key to moving us to sin is to get us to consider doubting God’s love for us, and even getting uus to question whether we even need God. Once he gets our attention, the devil them brings out the next weapon, self- pity. We begin to feel sorry for ourselves because we believe that some legitimate pleasure or action is being denied to us, which makes us begin to feel entitled to do what we want to do. Once this happens, we begin to seek an idol that will satisfy what we want and the devil is more than happy to fill us with suggesions, whatever our weakness may be.

     Once we settle on the idol we indulge in that obbject or activity to gain some sort of pleasure or excitement. It lasts very briefly. This brings us to effect sin has on us, namely guilt and possibly despair. We have gone from the Garden of Eden to the garbage dump and have no one to blame but ourselves.

   During Lent, you might want to consider things that make you doubt the goodness of God or whehter you even need him. You might also want to examine the feelings of self-pity which come along with goals that we not achieved. If we pray for the gift of faith and a clear vision whenever we experience the tempatation to doubt, we will hopefully realize that we have no right to feel sorry for ourselves, but grateful that God is with us always and will never lead us astray.

     If you are a baseball fan, you know that this is the time of year that Baseball teans go to Florida or  Arizona to get ready for the 162 game season. They work on the basics and fundamentals of the game so that they will be prepared for the long season ahead.

     Lent is in an analogous way spring trainig for the soul. We are not in a season, but in life and the world is busy working on us and pulling us in different directions and we need to start over with the basics once a year to be better prepared to carry on with our lives. The Church tells us that the basics are prayer, fasting and almsgiving. I have found in my experience that all three of these need further explanation. Today I will talk about prayer.

      We are told to pray, but have we ever been taught. many of us endured the catechetical and doctrinal dark ages of the 1970′s and 80′s and have been formed or malformed on how to pray. I bleieve that the basics of prayer consist of three parts: recollection, thanksgiving and petition.

    Recollection is the practice of quieting oneself down so that we are silent enough to hear God’s voice and receive his love. It appears that silence is a very uncomfortable thing for many people. It takes practice. We have to build up a tolerance for silence, sad to say. But once we are silent, we can begin to sense the stirring of our hearts and recognize our life with God.

    From recollection one moves to gratitude, because we are able to see the gifts we have and the abilities and opportunities that have been presented that we did not deserve, but have been freely given to use. It is a recognition of our spiritual wealth.

     In gratitudue we also see that we cannot do things without the help and intercession of others, so we can then petition or request from God the neccesary things to serve him well in this life and grow in the love of him and the love and service of our neighbor.

     These are the three basics. Once we have mastered these, then we can move on to more advanced ways of prayer that have their starting point in deeper silence. But let us first work on becoming silent and grateful and aware of our needs. We have to crawl before we can walk.

Tonight I spent most of the evening taping a 45 minute CD on the Eucharist and Sanity that I hope to copy and give away at different parishes over Lent. I believe with all my heart that the most sane and most human thing we can ever do is celebrate the Holy Eucharist. People are looking everywhere for answers to their chaotic lives and many avoid the obvious, the Mass. That is the pureness of sanity and reality because we do what comes from our true human nature, as revealed to us by Jesus Christ. In the CD I say that The Mass restores our sanity in three ways: It makes us remember who we are: sinners who are raised to the dignity of Children of God by the cross and resurrection of Jesus Christ. It also “RE-MEMBERS” us in the sense that as life continually tries to pull us apart, the Eucharist reassembles us and cleanses us and heals us and makes us who we were truly created to be: saints. It also calls to mind the necessity of sacrifice, the Sacrifice of Christ and our sharing in that sacrifice by lifting up our sin-filled wounded and broken hearts to the Lord that he can restore us to sanity again. Lastly, I speak of the effects of the Eucharist as giving us silence, clarity, strength, courage and confidence that God will not allow is to be destroyed but to be renewed. The Mass is not an opportunity for entertainment or distraction, but rather it is the fullest encounter of the reality of God’s love and presence this side of heaven. I hope the feeble attempt at expressing this great mystery may let someone who is wallowing in the insanity of this life return to Christ and the Eucharist and find the joy that God wants him or to her have.

The Franciscan Jacopone daTodi whom some believe authored the Lenten hymn Stabat Mater wrote that “Love is nailed to the cross and he will not come down.” That has lead some to say that it was not nails that fixed Christ to the cross, but his love for us. During his passion Satan used the people mocking him to tempt him “Come down from that cross and then we will believe you. However, Jesus proved his divinity by staying on the cross. As Catholics, the crucifix takes on particular significance. The crucifix is a more powerful image for us over a cross because it reminds us of a statement that Blaise Pascal once made, “Christ is on the cross as long as there is suffering in the world.” No one suffers alone.

I think one can also say that Christ is on the cross as long as there is someone who is still feels unloved in this world or rejected or persecuted. This is important to keep in mind in light of the Gospel passage from we heard at Mass. Take up your cross daily and follow me. To take up the cross means to bear ones own burdens as well as the burdens of others and to do that we must love. We cannot sustain this out of sympathy or guilt, only love. Love truly is our greatest cross, and the more we love the greater the cross becomes, but the mystery lies in the reality that the burden becomes lighter because we realize that we are only to bear our own crosses and those of others because Christ is bearing them with us.

Everyday provides us with a new lesson in love to learn, a new test in how much we love, and a realization that our love for God or other will never be full in this life. That thought ought not make us despair or become neurotic. It ought to inspire to seek new ways to express that love through prayer, acts of generosity and reparation. St. Teresa of Avila reminds us in her autobiography that we will ultimately be judged on not how much we knew or how much we believed, but rather how much we loved. Maybe that can become for us a daily measure of whether we have grown closer to or farther away from God. The Crosses that life gives us always presents more opportunities for holiness. Lets not pass them up, but hold on to them, realizing that Jesus is holding onto them with us.

We begin another season of Lent today. It is an annual examination we take to see how far we have progressed in our relationship with God and how far we still have to go. I have wondered why we start Lent in the middle of the week rather than on a Sunday. I believe the reason is that it allows us to transition into a penitential life slowly and gradually.We human beings do not like quick changes and we are more likely to stick with things if we kind of ease into it rather than abruptly begin them.

Lent is more like a walk than a run, or a marathon rather than a sprint. We did not get where we are over night and I think it would be foolish to think we can change overnight.In these transition days, I would encourage people to look at their Lenten penances both in terms of what they give up and what they take on. If we have drastic goals, the odds are that we are not going to make the distance, much less the weekend or even tomorrow.These days can allow us to test things out so that by Sunday as we hear the story of the Temptations of Jesus, we can be better equipped to deal with the changes we are trying to implement in order to be more fully alive to the action and grace of God.

I am finishing up taping my 4 CD Lenten talks entitled “Christ or Chaos: How life in Christ helps us overcome the Chaos in our lives.”Most of us are living chaotic lives and we may think it is normal- something that is just part of being in the post-modern world. I think that this is a lie. A chaotic life is simply a life in which God is in the back seat, (or maybe even in the trunk) and we are trying to drive by ourselves to a destination that we can never reach on our own. That approach to life makes us angry, frustrated, fearful and very tired. Christ gives us the better way. He gives us the truly human way. It is the way of Love, but the cross there and we can not avoid it or drown it our with all the distractions we make for ourselves.

My advice for the end of this first day if Lent is look at what you have decided to do to help you love God more and get prepared for the great feast of Easter. See if your penances are going to work out. Don’t give up on changing something this season or give into the easy way. Go through the chaos you are dealing with and you will come out on the other side with a better view of yourself and God, and how much he wants to you really find and experience joy.