My dear friends in Christ, I welcome you to this grace-filled season of Lent. Lent is a penitential period when we commemorate the forty days Jesus spent in the wilderness to prepare himself for his ministry. He fasted and faced difficult challenges; however, he was enabled by the Holy Spirit to overcome these challenges by praying and remaining focused on the mission entrusted to him by His Father. As disciples of Jesus, we are invited during this period of Lent to have a pause and to beam a searchlight on the aspects of our lives that need spiritual ventilation. The ashes we received on Ash Wednesday underscored the urgency for us to amend our ways.

Do you live a dishonest life? Are you easily agitated or angered? Are you in perpetual conflict with your siblings or spouse or neighbours or friends? Is your prayer life rusty? Are you jealous or envious?

Lent is a time for a new beginning — a time to reset the button by putting God first again in your life through choosing virtues and avoiding vices. It is a period of prayer, fasting and almsgiving. Prayer, fasting and almsgiving should elicit a change of heart in us and enable us to renew our Baptismal covenant with God, which is to reject Satan (evil) and place our trust and hope in the one true God.

The first reading recounts the fall of Adam and Eve from the state of grace. This fall of our first parents is referred to in our Catholic tradition as the Original Sin — the loss of their “original holiness.”

Today’s Gospel passage (Mt 4:1-11) narrates some of the temptations Jesus had during his ministry. The book of Hebrews testifies that Jesus is our high priest and that he “is not indifferent to our weaknesses, for he was tempted in every way just as we are, yet without sin” (Heb 4:15). Jesus’ temptations focus on how we use power or authority (turning stone into bread); pride (jumping down from the parapet of the Temple); and vain glory (bowing down to worship the Devil to become a king and wealthy).

Jesus, unlike Adam and Eve, resisted the temptations from the Evil One. Hence, he committed himself to the mission entrusted to him by God the Father for the salvation of the world. During our Baptism, we promised to reject Satan and sin, by professing to worship the only one true God. We know that, like Adam and Eve, we do falter from our baptismal promises by caving in to the trappings of the Evil One. Lent calls us to repentance.

We pray that the Lord of the covenant will grant you a grace of renewal during this Lenten period, so that you will rise anew with Jesus at Easter!