Ash Wednesday

Ash Wednesday ushers in the season of Lent with its associations of giving up things like candy. The message seems negative: ashes and the word “Repent!” Most of us already do a good deal of repenting and regretting. But then comes “Hear the good news!” Now that sounds well worth the effort.

So, this Lent, let’s concentrate instead on hearing the good news.

When we do hear it, great things happen. Let me tell you about one young woman... Trudy entered the Sisters of St. Joseph and all was well till she was sent on her first mission, to look after the little ones at the orphanage. Oh my! How she loved them! How she longed for a family and babies of her own! (Remember, she had not yet made her final vows.) She went to a priest, looking for counsel. He said, “If you think you’d make that good a wife and mother, you’ll probably make a perfect nun.” And so she stayed.

Over the years Sister Trudy has gone on to spread the word of God through the streets of Toronto’s Parkdale, through the villages of Guatemala and the missions of western Canada.

The good news is right there in front of us, in the Scriptures, in the world around us, in the people we meet every day.

“O that today you would listen to his voice!” - Psalm 95:7

By Mary Buckley CSJ