First Sunday of Lent
As we
prepare for Easter with our 40 days of Lent, the Gospel for this Sunday reminds
us of the time Our Lord spent in the desert preparing Himself.
Immediately after His baptism, our
Lord began to prepare for His public life by a fast of forty days in the
mountainous desert which stretches between Jericho and the mountains of Judea.
It was there that He was tempted by Satan, who wished to discover whether the
son of Mary was in reality the Son of God (Gospel).
As in the case of Adam, he addresses
his first attack to the senses. Our Lord is hungry and the tempter suggests to
Him that He should turn stones into bread. In the same way he tries, during
these forty days, to make us give up our fasting and mortification. This is the
concupiscence of the flesh.
The devil had promised our first
parent that he should be as God. Now he takes our Lord to the pinnacle of the
Temple and tries to induce Him to let Himself be carried by the angels through
the air amidst the applause of the crowds below. Satan tempts us by pride,
which is opposed to the spirit of prayer and meditation on God's word. This is
the pride of life.
Finally, just as he had promised
Adam a knowledge which like that of God Himself, should enable him to know all
things, so Satan assures Jesus that he will make Him ruler over all created
things if He will fall at his feet and worship him. In the same way the devil
seeks to attach us to temporal goods, when we ought, by alms and works of
charity, to be doing good to our neighbor. This is the concupiscence of the
eyes or avarice.
In this "acceptable time"
and in these "days of salvation" let us purify ourselves with the
Church (Collect), "in fastings, in chastity," by zeal in hearing and
meditating on the word of God and by charity unfeigned (Epistle).
Source: Dom Gaspar Lefebvre, OSB,
1945, adapted and abridged
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