We are less than a week into Lent and the weariness is setting in for many of us who have chosen to make a Lenten sacrifice. I’ve often wondered if the weekend has something to do with it. Ash Wednesday falls in the middle of the week, when most people are locked in to their school and work schedule. It’s easy to choose to do the right thing when so many of your decisions are already made for you. But when that TGIF hits, some of us forget about that “G” part until we attend Mass on Sunday (and sometimes even that doesn’t happen).
The weekend is full of temptations for just about all of us. Eating too much junk. Drinking too much alcohol. Lounging around the living room or even in bed. Many of us made Lenten promises in an attempt to get away from those behaviors, but how easy it is to forget when we are unencumbered by our 9-to-5s.
What can we do on the weekend during Lent to stay on track with our mission?
- Attend Stations of the Cross, eucharistic adoration or another faith-based event after work on Fridays. My parish (St. Joan of Arc in Aberdeen) offers a renowned fish fry before our Stations services. Come see us or visit another parish to see how Catholics around the Archdiocese of Baltimore are starting their weekends with worship. You can find a list of other fish fries in the Archdiocese of Baltimore here.
- Find a place where you can serve others on Saturdays (or really any day of the week). Again, check with your church or other local parishes, but also look to Catholic Charities who have a perennial need for volunteers and an easy-to-navigate website to help you find just the right place to spend some time helping others in need. https://cc-md.org/get-involved/volunteer/
- Go to Mass and be present. It’s hard for many people to get to Mass every Sunday. I always remind my own kids of how blessed we are to have a vehicle that runs, feet that walk, ears that can hear, and voices that can speak and sing, so there is no excuse for us (barring illness) not to go to Mass on Sundays.
If you do not have access to those three things, please contact your parish to see if someone can help with transportation and accessibility. If you want to be with God, he will find a way for you to be there. God always makes room for us in his busy schedule, so we do the same for him…but even that’s not always easy.
For the past few weeks, my son has been involved in a Saturday robotics club and my daughter has been involved in a lacrosse clinic, so we haven’t been able to attend regularly scheduled Mass times at SJA. We were, however, able to attend 5:30 pm Mass on Sundays at our neighboring parish, the St. Patrick in Havre de Grace. It’s been a pleasure to partake in Father Francis Ouma’s celebration of Mass, particularly his enlightening homilies.
I will be very honest and tell you that I recently didn’t feel like going to Mass one day. After spending hours in a stuffy indoor soccer arena only to be liberated by a gorgeous day walking and playing outside, I didn’t want to forgo galivanting about in the glorious daylight for incubating in a hard church pew as the night set in. When I feel like this, I always tell myself that a message will be waiting for me that I can only receive at Mass.
We heard the story of Adam and Eve defying God by consuming the forbidden fruit and of Jesus defeating the devil in the desert after wandering starved and, perhaps, delirious for 40 days. Father Francis gave a powerful homily about temptation and virtue. Just as he was about to conclude, he pointed out the very last stained glass window on his right depicting Jesus’ epic battle with the devil. Next to it was a window containing an image of St. Michael slaying the dragon. He commented that the person who decided to put those two windows together was very intelligent because the themes of overcoming temptation and evil were so present. He urged us to pray to St. Michael when we feel temptation this Lent. “The Lord is there,” he said, “walking you out of the fire, out of the pit, out of the chaos.”
If I hadn’t attended Mass that day, I would have never appreciated the significance of the relationship between those windows and the stories they relay. The sun was setting as the congregation saw Jesus and Michael illuminated by the setting sun as they triumphed over evil. I thought back to the weekend, what I did well, and what I could have done better. I decided to take Father Francis up on his advice and bring on an accomplice for my Lenten journey: St. Michael. I’ll pray for his intercession every day, but particularly when the weekend rolls around.
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