In a rare serendipitous confluence of events,
today we celebrate both Ash Wednesday, the beginning of Lent,
and Valentine’s Day, the celebration of Hearts and Love.
Lent is the spiritual preparation for the celebration of the greatest love story of all time.
The love story that fashioned out life from stardust
and then breathing a soul into it to make us happen.
The love story how we seek to destroy the beauty of that life
through our intransigence and hardheadedness.
The love story that seeks to right that fault
and finally bring us to perfection.
And in the contrarian ways of our Creator,
the spiritual exercises He challenges us to do
are in fact very physical.
Through these spiritual exercises,
we show our loves for our loved ones.
So, we show our love by giving:
we exercise our hand muscles when we open our hands to give,
we give of what we have,
we give away out treasure, which we earned through the work of our hands,
we give assistance when help in needed.
we give our presence, specially in times of pain and sufferings.
Then, we show our love by sacrificing:
we exercise our heart muscles when we deny ourselves
what our hearts desire,
we soften the hard muscles of the heart that have made it like a stone,
to make it a heart of flesh that beats for love alone.
Finally, we show our love by praying:
we exercise our head muscles when we lift up our minds in prayer,
we use our imagination and will
to align our desires and intentions
with those of what God wants for us.
We are but dust and our live is but a shadow.
But if we let God, He will turn our dust into gold
and our shadow into shimmering light.
Yes, it does make sense that Lent
begins with the celebration of Love.