Lent is God’s invitation to deepen our intimacy with Him.
Even though Ash Wednesday is a few days away, February 18, the invitation has already arrived. It is nearby, unopened … waiting.
If we listen closely, something is stirring in our soul. It is not just sentimentality or the desire for selfimprovement. Fear and pride can hide disguised under self-improvement projects for years.
The soul is deep and vast. It lies in a region beyond the coping mechanisms, the rush, the tumult of every day. The thing that blocks our way, and God’s way, to our soul is sin.
The invitation begins, “Turn away from sin …” Those are the words of Ash Wednesday. It's possible for the invitation to feel like the heaviest thing in the world. Stubborn and insistent layers build up between us and our soul - layers of sin. Sin doesn’t mean we are bad people. It means we are wounded. And wounds look for rewards.
Temptation opens one curtain after another for us, promising us all kinds of rewards, riches, and advancement if only we listen and follow the path away from God. And we get lost in a maze of confusion that leads away from the depths of our soul. It can be difficult for us to reach our soul.
But it is easy for God. And He wants to stir something in our soul on 2/18/26, but also now, today. Open the invitation. A great way to open the invitation is to go to Confession. That is the way God gives us to turn away from sin. Confession heals wounds. And with wounds healed, sin runs out of gas.
Lent is right around the corner. So is God.
Open the invitation now. Follow Him today.
God bless,
Msgr. Bransfield
