Repost of thoughts from 2004, sent to my Catholic friends

I sent this to a select list of people I know just now. I'm on my way to go shopping. I'm going to try again this year to have a vegan Lent.

........

I found the thoughts included in this email about
Ash Wednesday in a blog I posted in 2004. I hope
you don't mind if I share them with you.

But first: a plug for Ash Wednesday Mass at 8
p.m. at St. Thomas Aquinas Church. The Mass is
being said by a Jesuit from St. Patrick Seminary
in Latin. Make sure not to miss the
world-traveled St. Ann Choir singing Gregorian
chant and polyphony. Come get your ashes the old
style way.

Memento, homo, quia pulvis es, et in pulverem
reverteris.

Remember, o man, that thou art dust, and unto
dust shalt thou return.


Will Everyone Who Wants to Be Holy Raise a Hand?

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This quote the Morning Prayer for Ash Wednesday
summarizes part of what a fast can help us to do:

-------- quote -----------------
May we abstain from what we do not really need
and help our brothers who are in distress.

-------- end quote -----------------


Even if we cannot establish any direct connection
between our underconsumption and someone else's
ability to get food, we are able to create that
direct connection by giving alms. Freeing up our
resources by underconsumption lets us live on
less money, and it therefore allows us to be more
generous and gracious with our surplus, as God is
generous and gracious.

The Pope [JP II] said these thing about Lenten
practices at his Ash Wednesday audience:

-------- quote -----------------

The Church has always indicated some useful means
to advance on this path [to holiness]. First of
all, humble and docile adherence to the will of
God accompanied by incessant prayer; the
penitential forms that are typical of the
Christian tradition, such as abstinence, fasting,
mortification and self-denial even of goods that
are legitimate in themselves; concrete gestures
of acceptance in relating to one's neighbor,
which today's page of the Gospel evokes with the
word "alms." All this is proposed again with
greater intensity during the Lenten period, which
represents, in this connection, an "intense time"
of spiritual training and of generous service to
brothers.

-------- end quote -----------------

Pope John Paul II introduced the above practices
as means to get holy. Will everyone who wants to
get holy raise her or his hand? Holiness doesn't
mean self-righteousness. For those of us who
hunger and thirst for righteousness Lenten
practices can help get us in shape spiritually.
To paraphrase what the Pope said, here is what we
have to do:

Live in God's will (not in sin)
Pray always (which helps us with the first
requirement)
Abstain from what we don't need
Fast
Humble ourselves (mortification)
Say no to self-will and selfish pursuits even to
things that are good that might distract us from
God
Be generous and give alms (which the Pope called
"gestures of acceptance in relating to one's
neighbor")

Lent is one of the special times to practice
these things that bring us to holiness, because
holiness is expected of every Christian. Lent is
our boot camp for our life during the rest of the
liturgical year.

http://catholic-fasting.blogspot.com/