Dear Friends in Christ our King,
As we open the month of March with Quinquagesima Sunday tomorrow, we realize that Ash Wednesday, and thus Lent, is only a small step away.
Just as a loving mother wakes her child early to ensure he is ready for school on time, Holy Mother Church gives us the season of Septuagesima to prepare for Lent. She knows that we, her children, are often sluggish and resistant to the sacrifices required for spiritual growth. If we neglect this time of preparation, we risk entering Lent unprepared, with hardened hearts that cannot fully receive the grace God wants to give us.
A key obstacle to this preparation is the vice of sloth—not just physical laziness, but a spiritual sluggishness that resists making efforts for God. St. Thomas Aquinas teaches that sloth is opposed to charity because it makes a person sorrowful about spiritual good. To overcome it, we must increase our love for God through knowing Him, by means such as spiritual reading and meditating on the Four Last Things.
And so, like our mothers in the morning, Holy Mother Church is calling us now to wake up and get ready for Lent. There is no snoozing during this last stretch in this season of Septuagesima! We should begin each day with a prayer to Mary, our spiritual mother, asking for her guidance and strength to prepare well.