Many years ago, I remember that once when he approached the Lenten season, my mother encouraged me to go to a Lenten talks to be organized at the parish. I wondered:
- Why do not you decide to attend?
As a typical rebellious teenager answered, "Because they
very boring and attend only "oldies." Better, I'll pass!
"But there are guys your age. Also going to go your own school mates. -Back to the load.
So, finally and reluctantly, decided to attend. To my surprise, when I arrived, the church was completely packed and mostly with young people. With difficulty I located a place in the last pew.
not expect that that priest was a great preacher. Immediately caught my attention because it had funny anecdotes and edifying, entertaining events and what "I won" was that he knew by heart some lyrics of my favorite songs.
I have recorded in the memory of those discussions revolved around the song "Shadows" of the then popular ranchera singer and tickets, Javier Solis. He said the tune: "Shadows nothing else, between your life and mine / shadows no more, from your love and my love."
And the priest pondered aloud
- Why sometimes we distance ourselves both from God and spend months and months and do not frequent? Why your life is reduced to shades and shadows in your dealings with the Lord when I could be if you were proposed, an ongoing dialogue of a child with his father, from friend to friend? That
meditation had on me the force of a bomb blast. " Because I did not expect that from that melody which I loved, the priest will take out a hitherto unsuspected spiritual benefit to me.
And I concluded to myself
"This priest is absolutely right. My relationship with God is cold, aloof, distant. Why not bring myself to change it? In addition, just help me decide, and that the Lord help me to achieve that closeness with him depends on me, in good part.
And indeed, my relationship with God has improved significantly thanks to these Lenten conversations, the one sympathetic preacher and my mother's insistence. Why
I say this? Because Lent leads to Easter celebration. And in the recent message from Pope Benedict XVI on this liturgical season, we recommend traditional practices such as fasting, almsgiving, prayer, meditate on the Passion of Christ and of course, spiritual exercises, also called retreats spiritual.
special way I liked the thought of Pope: "Supporting the deprivation of something-and not only superfluous, we learn to look away from our self, to discover anyone on our side and acknowledge God in faces of so many brothers. "
Without doubt, one of the most valued mortifications the Lord are those aimed at more and better serve our neighbor. That often begins with an inner personal change to overcome, for example, our temper, our impatience, smiling to those in need, listen closely to an older person whose conversation may not interest us much, bear with patience defects others, gladly anticipate the service-for example, in the material details that make life pleasant family home in the daily activity and so many things ...
sometimes think that to please God for the Lent focuses exclusively on making great penance or a deep prayer y elevada, cuando tantas veces los que conviven a nuestro lado (en la familia, en la oficina…) están esperando ese detalle de caridad y de servicio, quizá pequeño y ordinario, pero de antemano sabemos que ¡valoran tanto!
Recuerdo a un amigo que cuando le contaban un buen chiste, de inmediato lo anotaba. Le pregunté por qué tenía esa costumbre. Me respondió con prontitud:
-Muchas veces tengo que visitar a familiares y amigos enfermos, tristes o con algún padecimiento crónico. Me parece que la mejor forma de vivir la caridad es llevarles un rato de alegría, contándoles chistes divertidos y contagiarles de buen humor.
¿Habías pensado, amigo lector, que también la Lent is that dimension of bringing the joy of Christ to others?
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