More Thoughts During Lent

Lent is always such an emotionally mixed bag for me... and that's so
frustrating because I really don't want it to be emotional at all.

Many have said it before and said it better than me: The closer we get to
God the more acutely aware become of our own sin. Just when I think I can't
take another step forward, I become aware, in some way and once again, that
God's mercy and grace are "bigger" than I thought.

I've been praying the Rosary periodically for the past year. I know most
Protestants become Hoovers when I say that. But to be honest, when I pray
the Rosary, it's not about Mary. I think Mary helps with my prayers but
it's not about her. It's all about her Blessed Son. Today, as I prayed the
Sorrowful Mysteries, focusing on the last day of Jesus' life, I was so
forcefully struck, again, that the suffering, the incredible,
incomprehensible and intentionally CHOSEN suffering Jesus endured was for
me.

Every morning during Lent, the antiphon for the Invitatory Psalm is: "Come
let us worship Christ the Lord who, for our sake, endured temptation and
suffering." For our sake... It wasn't for his sake. He didn't need
anything suffering might offer him. He gained nothing by it. It was all
for my sake... for our sake.

And the last reading this morning was from the prophet Joel: "Return to me
with your whole heart, with fasting, and with weeping, and mourning; rend
your hearts, not your garments, and return to the Lord, your God. For
gracious and merciful is he, slow to anger, rich in kindness, and relenting
in punishment." (Joel 2:12-13)

I still have comprehended so little of God grace and mercy... and it seems
that the only way for me to more fully realize and comprehend his grace and
mercy are for me to more fully realize and comprehend my own sinfulness and
desperate situation without them... without him.

Perhaps fasting during Lent really does have an effect on prayer. I don't
understand it, how it can... but maybe there's something to it, after all.

Perhaps I need to fast during other times, as well...