Sunday Gospel Reflection, February 22, 2026: Jesus was led by the Spirit into the desert...

Jesus was led by the Spirit into the desert…
Are we ready to enter into the desert of Lent? 

   In the Creation story of the second chapter of Genesis, the Lord God forms man out of the clay of the ground and blows into his nostrils the breath of life. It is a moment of striking intimacy, an action on God’s part to make of his creation man, a living being, a being created to love God. But God also creates the tree of the knowledge of good and evil in the midst of the garden in Eden and tells the man that he is free to eat from any of the trees of the garden except this tree. The man thus has a choice, the free will to choose what is right or what is wrong. Free will is necessary to human existence, for, if God created us to love God, we need to be able to choose. But humankind is tempted by a desire for control, and thus both the woman and the man, tempted by the serpent, eat some of its fruit. Together, they choose to disobey God’s command, and the consequences will be grave indeed. One can imagine them singing Psalm 51, Be merciful, O Lord, for we have sinned, as they leave paradise in shame. 

   Thus, as Paul reminds the Romans, Through one man sin entered the world, and through sin, death. The trespass of Adam is a transgression that led to human mortality. But, Paul goes on to say, just as through the disobedience of the one man, the many were made sinners, so, through the obedience of the one, the many will be made righteous. Jesus came in order to surrender his life to God, taking our sins to the cross. Unlike Adam, Jesus brings life. 

   But first Jesus himself must experience temptation and choose. In Matthew’s Gospel, Jesus is led by the Spirit into the desert to be tempted by the devil. All three of the devil’s temptations – to command that stones become bread, to throw himself down from the parapet of the temple, and to prostrate himself and worship the devil – ask Jesus to rebel against God. But Jesus, God-made-man, steadfastly refuses: Get away, Satan! Jesus has journeyed into the desert to solidify his dedication to God’s will. In Lent, we are called to do the same, to take that very same journey into the desert, that we might learn obedience, rejecting sin in recognition of the gracious gift of the Lord, so that that grace, in turn, might overflow for the many. 

   Our journey begins! Are we ready?

This post was based on OLMC’s Scripture Class 2023.
Image source: www.wordclouds.com

God calls us to action (Fr. Patrick Michaels)

   When God appears to people, almost every time, he gives them directions as to what to do. He calls them to action. What’s curious is that, so often, we don’t respond with action. We respond with hesitation. 

    When they called a fast in Joel’s time, it was meant to be immediate. People weren’t to stop for anything. Even if you’ve just been married, you were to leave the wedding chamber. Everything was to be done in that moment, so that you could respond with repentance to God. Whenever something bad happened, they believed it was because they had sinned, and when the locusts came in to devour their crops, they were certain that they needed to repent, and so they called a fast. They called for repentance from the whole group, and the whole group responded. God called, and they responded. 

   God called, and Paul responded as well, as God calls each of us to respond: as ambassadors of Christ. To be ambassadors of Christ means that we are the ones going out to make him present in the world, and that is where our energies need to be expended. Too often we expend our energies spinning on things we think we are supposed to be doing, when in fact the one thing we’ve been called to do is to make him present in the world, to bring the Eucharist we receive to bear upon the world in all of its brokenness, to bring mercy to bear. 

   Jesus has a great explanation for how we are to go about doing the various things that we might do as a Lenten observance. Yet the main thing here is, make sure you know why you’re doing it. Make sure you know why you’re giving up Brussels sprouts. Make sure you know what it has to do with being an ambassador for Christ, so that whatever you have chosen to do for Lent, it’s going to make you a better ambassador, more dedicated to the Word, to the mercy that has been shown you, so that you might show it to others. 

   Whatever we do needs to serve his will. He has called us to action, not to complacency. He has called us to more, so that he might live more profoundly in the world. 

--Fr. Patrick Michaels,
Homily, Ash Wednesday,
February 14, 2024

Today is Ash Wednesday!
Don't forget to fast!

Image source: Bayeux Tapestry, Feast of William the Conqueror panel, https://www.oursundayvisitor.com/whats-the-point-of-fasting-during-lent/

Your heart equals my heart (Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer)

In a circle of mountains
it’s easier to remember
we belong to the mountains,
belong to high-pitched cheep
of pica, belong to the cliffs,
to the path, to the unpath,
belong to the blue,
blue reach of sky. 

We belong as much to each other
as we belong to ourselves,
each of us a poem read by strangers
and beloveds in ways only they can read us,
each of us constantly rewriting
our lines, while in the meantime
we are constantly rewritten
by a great and unnamable
is-ness that rhymes us each to each other. 

We belong to the truth
that all belongs, even when we
are most lonely, even when
we would rather push away
from the world. 

In a circle of mountains,
it is easier to practice belonging—
easier to notice this math:
your heart equals my heart,
and all this opening, opening, opening
to what we cannot know,
that equals what a life is for. 

—Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer,
In a Circle of Mountains

Image source: OLMC’s “Chosen” group prays for the world at the end of its last 2025 meeting. Photo by Danny Gutierrez, https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=1328667335965344&set=pb.100064662700877.-2207520000&type=3
Poem source 

We are to love (Thomas Merton)

I once asked an old man:
 Which is more important, to love or to be loved?
 He replied: Which is more important to a bird?
The left wing or the right wing? 

 --Author unknown

   Our job is to love others without stopping to inquire whether or not they are worthy. That is not our business and, in fact, it is nobody’s business. What we are to do is to love, and this love itself will render both ourselves and our neighbor worthy. 

--Thomas Merton

Image source: https://bmtrust.org/event/valentines-nature-heart-hunt/
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The lens of love (Fr. Patrick Michaels / Rachel Marie Martin)

Discernment is God's information
that teaches us what love really is.

--Fr. Patrick Michaels,
OLMC Scripture Class

   When my kids were little and they’d leave for school I ask them if they have their sunglasses on. Not real sunglasses, but imaginary sunglasses, glasses of love. I wanted them to see the world through that lens, not the lens of negativity, self-doubt, criticism, worry, fear or comparison. 

   But the lens of love. 

   Sometimes they chuckled at the idea, but it was and is a powerful reminder to take stock in how you see the world. 

   We cannot control all the circumstances.
   We cannot control other people.
   But we can control our response.
   We can control how we see others.
   We can control how we treat others.
   We can control how we view ourselves. 

   When we look through the lens of love it gives us a great gift - margin, space, a breath. It allows us a split second moment to respond differently, to gather courage, to be brave, to be kind, to make a difference, to breathe. 

   Sometimes those "glasses" fall off.
   But the beauty is we can always put them back on again. 

   Love teaches us to have grace for ourselves and others.
   Love teaches us to look beyond fear.
   Love teaches us to have courage and bravery.
   Love teaches us to be kind. 

    So even if it is silly, I’d remind them.
   "Wear your glasses today." 

   You too. Dare to see the world through the lens of love. Dare to put on your own glasses. It doesn't mean it will be perfect, easy, and bubble gum and rainbows. It simply means that you aren't pushed around by the waves of life and that you have decided your heart, your mind, your life is greater than just random. 

   Love matters.
   Love wins.
   Love cares. 
   Love conquers.
   Love heals.
   Love well. 

-- Rachel Marie Martin         

Image source: https://tinybuddha.com/blog/all-about-perception-lens-love-or-fear/
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Love is our vocation (Fr. Patrick Michaels / James Baldwin)

Love is our vocation –
it’s all we have been called to do.
 We’ve been given very, very different lives,
and very different ways in our lives,
but they all boil down to this one call,
this vocation to love.

--Fr. Patrick Michaels,
Homily, October 1, 2025 

    The longer I live, the more deeply I learn that love — whether we call it friendship or family or romance — is the work of mirroring and magnifying each other’s light. Gentle work. Steadfast work. Life-saving work in those moments when life and shame and sorrow occlude our own light from our view, but there is still a clear-eyed loving person to beam it back. In our best moments, we are that person for another. 

--James Baldwin 

Image source: https://in.pinterest.com/2beamscotty/the-artistic-bird/
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Standing before he who is love (Pope Francis)

   Here then is some advice for making important choices. When I do not know what to do, how to make a definitive choice, an important decision, a decision that involves Jesus’ love, what must I do? 

   Before deciding, let us imagine that we are standing in front of Jesus, as at the end of life, before he who is love. And imagining ourselves there, in his presence, at the threshold of eternity, we make the decision for today. We must decide in this way: always looking to eternity, looking at Jesus. It may not be the easiest, it may not be the most immediate, but it will be the right one. 

--Pope Francis 

Image source: Quentin Massys, Christ Blessing (ca. 1500), https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/clydxld8k80o
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