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True Love Means Knowing His Name The 1970s rock band The Doors had a popular “love” song with the lyric, “Hello, I love you, won’t you tell me your name?” If God had been the lyricist, “Hello, I love you, that’s why I told you my name,” would have been far, far better. The Christian life, including Lent, is about true and eternal love, and true love longs to be in the presence of the one loved. So, when we pray the Our Father, we first place ourselves in his presence. This is what Jesus does when he journeys in the desert: “Filled with the Holy Spirit, Jesus returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit into the desert for forty days.” If Lent is going to take us into a deeper relationship with the Father, we need to begin by first being in that relationship. It begins at baptism, but it will sometimes need to be restored through the sacrament of reconciliation. This is why Ash Wednesday focused so strongly on repentance and confession; its purpose was to reorientate us and prepare us for the forty days of Lent. Only after acknowledging our true relationship with God as needy sinners seeking his holiness can we can journey on to grow in that holiness and in our love for him.
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