A Reflection on the Daily-ness of Our LivesFebruary 26, 2024

A Reflection on the Daily-ness of Our Lives

We’re in the Church season of Lent, a time for prayer, fasting and almsgiving. I think we tend to focus on the end of Lent, the holy days of the Triduum and Jesus’ dying on the cross. What if we did not view the crucifixion as the only way Jesus gave His life for us, but instead we meditated on His entire life as His gift? Yes, Jesus poured out His life in agony through his death on the cross, but did He not pour out His life throughout the years of His hidden life at Nazareth as well?

With this in mind, let us reflect this Lent with an examination of conscience that is centered on the daily-ness of our lives similar to the daily-ness of Jesus’ life during His hidden years.

Make Holy the Daily

• Jesus’ days were filled with prayer to His Father, out of a relationship of the deepest love. How vibrant is my daily prayer life?
• Jesus’ days included tasks of maintaining the household, from the simple ones of a child through those required of an adult. Do I joyfully complete household responsibilities that make life easier for others?
• Jesus honored and respected all with whom He came in contact. Do I treat those around me with love or fail to even notice them because I’m so focused on my own wants and needs?
• Jesus experienced days of heat and times of cold. Do I complain about the weather and how it inconveniences me, or thank God for the blessings of a comfortable life in the 21stcentury?
• Jesus suffered with aches and pains, illnesses and perhaps injuries. How do I approach the days and nights when I experience the same?
• Jesus lived in an occupied country under Roman rule. Do I pray for and support in some way those who suffer persecution, violence and mistreatment by repressive governments across the world?
• Jesus lived in a much closer relationship to the natural world than we do today. Do I appreciate the beauty of all the earth and strive to preserve it for future generations?

Jesus, merciful Savior, You have gifted us with Your example of ways to make holy the daily-ness of our lives. Walk with me through these forty days of Lent. Be my guide as I strive to pour out my life in the hiddenness of all the routine days so that I may gradually be transformed until You call me to that final transformation from death to everlasting life. With a grateful heart, I say, Amen.

Sister Virginia DeVinne