Welcome to the wonderful season of Lent.
The entrance into the Lenten season is always made through the same porch where we gather on Ash Wednesday to receive the ashes and, with every good intention, try to prepare ourselves, through fasting, prayer and alms giving, for that great Feast of Easter.
The First Sunday is always focused on Jesus’ fast and temptation in the desert and the Second Sunday on his transfiguration. This year we shall hear from Matthews Gospel, for these first two Sundays. We shall also hear in our First Reading about the creation of man and woman and the first sin (Gen 2:7-9)
The Lenten liturgies which we shall celebrate do not contain a more abundant reading of scriptural texts than those of the rest of the year, although, the Liturgy of the Word during Lent turns out to be of a remarkable spiritual and doctrinal richness. The biblical texts having been admirably selected so that the meaning of Lent and the actions it entails might really be brought to light by God’s word. We find ourselves more often than not more focused, in our preparation for the upcoming Feast of Easter.
The Gospel of the temptation of Jesus in the desert, which we hear today, immediately places before our eyes Christ’s victory over Satan, whose dominion of humankind he destroys, calling all of us to fight with him, in a similar combat against the enemy of humanity.
The first pages of the Bible are devoted to the origins of the universe, humankind, and sin. In common parlance, we speak of the “stories” of the creation and fall. Moreover it leads us to ask the difficult question, “what was the beginning of humanity and what were the origins of sin?’ We do not have in the first pages of Genesis a “naive” story of origins that the subsequent progress in knowledge would allow us to relegate to the category of so-called “primitive” legends. Such a judgment would betray a lack of discernment. We must, therefore, listen with great attention and perspicacity to the first reading this Sunday.
It is composed of two brief excerpts from rather a large unit. The beginning briefly recounts that after creating heaven and earth, God “fashioned man of dust from the soil. Then he breathed into his nostrils a breath of life, and thus man became a living being.” He then places him in the Garden of Eden. All this is told with an extreme economy. The original condition of humankind is a gift from God, and a fragile gift. Humans are not the owners of this garden in which God places them. They are not destined for death, but they can die if they disobey the command they have received. How is it that death, from being only a threat, has become the unavoidable fate of humankind? Even more precisely: How were human beings led to disobedience they knew would be punished by death? The inspired sage of Genesis ponders these questions, this enigma.
He does not give the solution in the manner of a teacher magisterially stating a correct answer. Instead, he imagines the dialogue between the “cunning” serpent and the woman, leaving it to the discerning reader to grasp the meaning of the story. Sin is disobedience, but a disobedience rooted in the heart. The tempter insidiously leads Adam and Eve to doubt God, to see in him as a jealous rival whose law prevents them from living life to the full.
Sin is not born of the attraction of the forbidden fruit, but of a perversion within oneself of God’s image, of the nature and the intent of the divine law. Only then does the forbidden fruit appear “good for food, pleasing to the eyes, and desirable.”
In the Book of Deuteronomy, we hear: “Here then, I have today 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…..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…..I have set before you life and death, the blessing and the curse. Choose life, then, and you and your descendants may live, by loving the Lord your God, heeding his voice, and holding fast to him.” (Deut 30:15-20)
Here then, is where sin and death come from: rather than listening to God and trusting him, we allow ourselves to be seduced and tricked by the suggestions of the evil one. Everything else follows. The tone of this reflection on the entrance of sin and death into the world is undeniably serious. Could it be otherwise? However, we have here a passage which is not meant to dramatize the present situation of humankind or cause fright or even despair. On the contrary. The woman was the victim of the serpent’s wile and was foolish enough to fall into the trap into which man allowed himself to follow. In the beginning, therefore, there was a wrong move, heavy with consequences. But this mistake is evoked with a gravity tempered with the gentleness of a sage who has knowledge of the subsequent history of humankind. We, too, know what happened afterward, as we join the author in this meditation. Man and woman—humanity—will be able to backtrack from this disastrous move; choose anew, with a fuller knowledge, of good and life; recognise the truth of the God, who loves them, their creator. This is why the meditation over the origin of sin and its entrance into the world is followed not by a song of lament and mourning, but by a psalm of repentance, that is, a confession of the Lord’s merciful love, a song of humble trust and hope. “Have mercy on us, O Lord, for we have sinned.”
By entering the world, sin and death have plunged humankind into a particularly gloomy state, although not a desperate one. Humans cannot reach God through their own strength because of the original sin inherited from our first parents at the ‘Fall’. But the situation is reversed and another era begins with the coming of Christ. For whoever relies on faith in Jesus Christ, life is already radically transformed. This is salvation, for in his Son, God himself comes to restore to humanity its former orientation and fulfils its expectation. Humans recover the possibility of entering again into communion with God, a state willed by the Creator “in the beginning.”
Throughout this Lenten season we are led on a joyful walk toward Easter and in the Gospel, we are given the perfect example of how to overcome temptation. After his Baptism in the Jordan “Jesus is led into the wilderness by the Spirit to be tempted by the devil.” The evangelist immediately adds however, that it is after having “fasted for forty days and forty nights” that Jesus’ hunger is the occasion of the devils first assault. And he concludes that after failing three times the devil leaves Jesus, and the angels come to serve him. We must guard against understanding this passage as a simple account of what Jesus does in the desert and of what happens to him. We must take the time to hear the harmonics of this story resonating in us. The forty days and forty nights that Jesus spends in the desert remind us of the forty years the people of God spent on their way to the Promised Land. The desert is a place of trials, as well as revelations. Matthew emphasises the first aspect, without forgetting that a stay in solitude can be peaceful: angels are near and serve him. There is no contradiction here. Solitude places us humans in the presence of God and ourselves without any possibility of escape; it forces us to make radical choices. We must decide to answer “yes” or “no” to God; the “yes, but” used routinely in ordinary life, proves impossible. The choice cannot be made without a violent struggle against the self and against the enticing solicitations of the devil. But when we succeed in answering “yes” to God’s call, the devil departs and peace takes possession of our whole being. Because he was truly human, the beloved Son of the Father could not bypass the test of the desert and of temptation; temptation was the more violent as his mission was loftier and more exacting than that of any other person. But his initial victory over the devil was definitive; nothing could cause him, who had received the fullness of the Spirit, to take back the “Yes” said to the Father. Leaving us a perfect example to follow.
We need to withdraw into solitude in order to discern God’s calls and to test the authenticity of the calls we have perceived. Lent is an ideal season, given annually by the Church to do this. Temptation may take on multiple forms in our everyday life, and in our human nature we will most certainly sometimes find the temptation too strong to resist, but we must rely on God’s Mercy and the salvation we have received. Jesus defeated the devil in the desert and ultimately on the cross, the battle is won for us. When Jesus began to teach, his victory over Satan was behind him; it is also behind us. No longer do Christians fight against the tempter and his snares in an unequal combat. We enter the fight with the solid support of the initial victory of the Head of the new humanity, with the weapons of faith in Christ. Satan is unmasked, whatever his disguise. Finally, Christians have been instructed by Christ to use the sword of the Word, the true meaning of which Jesus authoritatively revealed.
Saint Paul told us, speaking of Christ’s victory over death “Just as through one person sin entered the world, and through sin death…. So through one righteous act acquittal and life came to all.”
“As we begin this holy season of Lent, we give thanks to God the Father for this time of grace. Let us ask him to cleanse our hearts and strengthen us in love through the Holy Spirit.”
