Daily Reflection, March 7, 2025

Reflection:

Food… Lent… Fast…. Yes, we’re back to the time in our year and our lives when we are encouraged to fast. We are on the road to Jerusalem once more. We must take this road each year of our lives.

The Prophet gives us words of challenge and of words of hope. This passage points to a new moment in the lives of the captives who are being brought home from exile. We are encouraged to understand what real fasting means.  It’s not about punishing yourself or starving yourself. Rather it is all about relationships, but relationships that are right relationships. Seems that God is keen to see each of God’s children given a fair deal. It gives us big thoughts. Am I willing to set those people free who are unjustly tied up in knots? Am I happy to open a door into freedom for those people who are oppressed? What about sharing my bread, my hope, my encouragement with those who are without hope? Am I ready to try to make space for the homeless? And let’s not forget that the prophet reminds us that we are not to “turn my back on those of my own household- the people close to me!! Ouch!

Your light will break forth like the dawn, and your wound be quickly healed.

We are encouraged to understand that we need to fast from those things, those attitudes that take life away from me or from anyone else. This is a special gift I can share with people who are threatened the most and not able to take care of themselves. Don’t be miserable with others or with yourself.

There is a time to fast, and there is a time to feast. Jesus puts fasting into a clearer perspective. Keep your eyes on me, and I will help you to know how to live, how to celebrate, what you are encouraged to let go, set free and come to a new sort of freedom to make life easier, happier and more connected. Lent is a six-week season in learning how to share my life with others. Stop worshipping that lethal trinity I, MYSELF, ME.  Start believing in the Blessed Trinity, which shows what the community of life can look like.

Fr. Kevin Dance CP lives at St.Brigid’s Retreat, Marrickville. He is very actively involved in ministries locally and at Passionist International where he served as the Executive Director for many years.