In Lent, turn toward Jesus, away from sin

1st Sunday of Lent (A)

By Msgr. John N. Fell

Our annual journey toward Easter has begun. The great season of Lent is upon us, for Lent is, above all else, an opportunity to prepare for Easter. For those who seek Baptism, Lent is a final period of intense preparation for full, sacramental participation in the life of Christ. For those already baptized, Lent is an especially graced opportunity to renew our seeking after the Lord, to once again unite ourselves with Christ’s suffering and selfgiving so that we might also share in his glorious victory over sin and death.

Our Gospel reading this first Sunday of Lent is St. Matthew’s account of Jesus’ Temptations in the Desert. This text has been attached to the First Sunday of Lent in a tradition dating back more than over 1,500 years. The Gospel highlights the the disaster and ruination that befalls humanity through sin, but the story of Jesus Christ gives us the supreme hope that our fallen condition can be overcome. That is the choice this Lenten season places before us — the path of sin or the path of Christ, death or life, the curse or the blessing. profound reality of both Jesus’ divinity and his humanity, and, in so doing, calls us back to the realities of sin and temptation as well as to our ability to overcome them by our reliance on the power of Jesus working through us.

Illustrating that we all must face this choice, St. Matthew presents Jesus himself as being tempted by the Evil One. Having fasted for 40 days and nights in the desert, Jesus faces allures of Satan’s power.

Jesus’ hunger became the opportunity for Satan’s first temptation. The devil appeared and prompted Jesus to satisfy his hunger by changing the stones on the desert floor into bread. He was tempted to use his power for his own purposes, rather than for his Father’s plan. Jesus answered Satan, quoting a verse from the Book of Deuteronomy highlighting God’s protective care, “Not on bread alone shall man live, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God” (Dt 8:3).

In a second temptation, the devil led Jesus to the parapet of the Temple in Jerusalem. Satan challenged Jesus to jump off the tower and make God send angels to rescue him. He was being tempted to test God rather than to trust him. Jesus replied to the devil, again using the words of Deuteronomy to resist the temptations, “You shall not put the Lord your God to the test” (Dt 6:16). Jesus’ answer here calls to mind the People of Israel who failed God by testing him at Meribah (see Exodus 17:1-7). Jesus would remain faithful where the Old Testament people had succumbed to their temptations.

Our first and second readings this Sunday provide an interesting Good News-Bad News context in which to consider the message of St. Matthew’s Gospel. Our first reading, taken from the Book of Genesis, is the story both of human creation as well as the first sin. Adam and Eve lived in perfect paradise, and yet yielded to the human temptation to go against God. Rather than trusting the path God had laid out for them, Adam and Eve, tempted by the Evil One, chose to put their own plans and desires ahead of God’s. The bad news is that sin entered the world when humanity sought to substitute its own ways for God’s ways.

Our second reading, taken from St. Paul’s Letter to the Romans, presents the good news. The good news is that “just as through one transgression condemnation came upon all, so, through one righteous act, acquittal and life came to all” (Rom 5:18). The story of Adam and Eve shows

Gabriel Possenti

1838-1862

February 27

The 11th of 13 children of a distinguished Italian lawyer who served the Papal States, Francesco Possenti was a bright, joyful youth, despite losing his mother when he was 4. Educated at the Jesuit college in Spoleto, he was seriously ill twice and vowed to become a religious if he recovered. He entered the Passionist novitiate in 1856, taking the name Gabriel of Our Lady of Sorrows. He served dutifully, with great piety and cheerfulness, dying from tuberculosis at the age of 24.