“The key to faith is what we are willing to sacrifice to obtain it.”

"You will save more souls through sacrifice and prayer than will a missionary through his teachings and sermons alone." - Our Lord to Saint Faustina

Scripture Text: (DT 30:15-20)
Moses said to the people:
“Today I have set before you
life and prosperity, death and doom.
If you obey the commandments of the LORD, your God,
which I enjoin on you today,
loving him, and walking in his ways,
and keeping his commandments, statutes and decrees,
you will live and grow numerous,
and the LORD, your God,
will bless you in the land you are entering to occupy.
If, however, you turn away your hearts and will not listen,
but are led astray and adore and serve other gods,
I tell you now that you will certainly perish;
you will not have a long life
on the land that you are crossing the Jordan to enter and occupy.
I call heaven and earth today to witness against you:
I have set before you life and death,
the blessing and the curse.
Choose life, then,
that you and your descendants may live, by loving the LORD, your God,
heeding his voice, and holding fast to him.
For that will mean life for you,
a long life for you to live on the land that the LORD swore
he would give to your fathers Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.”

Moses asked his followers to choose between "Life and Prosperity, Death and Doom." We would think that this should be an easy choice to make. Who would want to choose Death and Doom?

Yet, today, people all around us are choosing Death and Doom.

Our Scripture reading noted above reminds us of the power of our choices. Moses begins the passage in Deuteronomy with a stark and dramatic choice – a fork in the road in which one path leads to life and prosperity, the other to death and gloom – but the reality of making that choice is more subtle. Choosing the good path means doing things every day that may seem ordinary: obeying, loving, walking, and keeping. Yet these ordinary practices lead to living, growing, and even occupying a place of blessing and security.

Lent demands that we examine ourselves as individuals and as people. It invites us to explore what is present in the innermost recesses of our heart. Is it Hatred or Love? Is it Death and Doom or Life and Prosperity? Is it a commitment to choose Life and Prosperity despite of the culture of death that surrounds us? Or do we find that in the innermost depths of our hearts there is a conflict between hate and love, death and life?

Lent teaches us that we cannot live in both worlds.

Jesus says, "For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will save it. What profit is there for one to gain the whole world yet lose or forfeit him?"(Lk 9:22-25)

Who are we going to listen to?

During our Lenten Journey, let us choose Life and Prosperity with God's help!