REFLECTION FOR THE SECOND SUNDAY IN LENT (YEAR A), Week beginning 5TH MARCH 2023
The Cross looms most large over the holy season of Lent. It pervades every part of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. We can state with accuracy that the Mass and the Cross go “hand-in-hand”.
At every Mass, Jesus Our Lord offers Himself to God the Father on our behalf. The altar is corresponding to the Calvary Cross.
His once-for-all self-sacrifice on the first Good Friday is presented again (re-presented) on the altar in sacramental form. Thus He is truly present for us. This is His Real Presence. He truly visits us in Holy Communion: His Person to our person.
(Even if we cannot personally receive Him, we should request our Guardian Angel to make a Spiritual Communion on our behalf. The saint of Auschwitz, Maximillian Kolbe. has famously said the one subject making angels envious of humans would be Holy Communion).
The Liturgy of the Eucharist is the second of the two major parts of the Mass; the first is the Liturgy of the Word.
Jesus is truly present at that point of the Mass. He is the very Word of God. When the Gospel is read, it is He Who is the true reader. Two of the altar servers (acolytes) will face one another, the lectern being in between
them. This symbolizes that they are enclosing Jesus Christ, the Word of God and the Light of the World. They do this only for the Gospel, for that alone gives the actual word(s) of Jesus (i.e. “direct speech”).
This Lent, let us all determine to venerate the Liturgy of the Word.
Let us commit, whether as individual or family, to arriving at Mass in good time, and to taking up your Mass sheet/missalette.
Then that missalette can serve to sharpen our focus in our engagement with Jesus.
Good Shepherd Catholic Church 