In part, the Preface of the Mass during the Season of Lent includes:
Lord, each year you give us this joyful season when we prepare to celebrate the Easter mystery with mind and heart renewed. You give us a spirit of loving reverence for you, our Father, and of willing service to our neighbor.
It is in the prayer of the Church that we find the mystery of the Christian life revealed. Here, in this Lenten Preface, the meaning of Lent is succinctly stated. Lent is a time for the whole person to be renewed, and this renewal finds its source in the love of God and the service to our neighbor.
The articulation of our faith is found in the way we pray. Should someone ask you what it means to be Catholic, I suggest that the answer be “come to church with me and you will see.” The Mass is an instrument of evangelization.
The texts of the Mass for the Season of Lent are the oldest in the life of the Church. They represent the primitive belief of the first generations of Christian life. For this reason, they are fundamental to our appreciation of the faith we have inherited from that early Church.
Next week and the two weeks following, the prayers and the Gospel especially will address the very center of what it is to be a disciple of Jesus.
Fr. Steve Adrian
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