Homily for Ash Wednesday Year C (1)

Theme: DO NOT FAKE HOLINESS

By: Fr. Emmanuel Nnamdi Megwara, MSP.

Homily for Wednesday March 2 2022

*EVENT* : Ash Wednesday (Fast and Abstinence)
*COLOUR*:Violet
*READINGS* : Joel 2:12-18; Resp. Psalm 51:3-4.5-6ab.12-13.14.17; 2Cor. 5:20-6:2; Matt. 6:1-6.16-18.

Greetings beloved people of God, and welcome to “My Catholic Homily Digest”. On this most solemn Wednesday, in which the ash of repentance is being marked on all believers as a memorial of our nothingness, I wish to reflect with you on the theme: ” *Do Not Fake Holiness*”. Beloved in Christ, the Lenten season is here again. And I choose to call this most holy and sacred period of the year, “the period of grace and second chance”, for us all. Ash Wednesday, begins the Lenten season of the Church each year. It is not just a memorial Mass with ritualistic significance, it is a visible sign, which shows our regret and hatred for our sins. The practice of using Ash on this day is to remind ourselves that we are nothing before God, but dust, and that to the same dust we shall return when our time expires from this life. Hence, during these forty days of Lent, we are meant to live contritely, renouncing our sins and evil ways just like the Ninevites, who covered themselves with Ashes when Jonah preached to them.

Through the first reading of today, the prophet Joel, challenged us to be truly sorry for our sins. According to him, contrition is not just a lip-service renunciation of wrong doings, not just a ritualistic show of repentance, not a hypocritical display of Lenten religiosity, not a show of prayerfulness, not a public denunciation of food, water or other forms of enjoyments, and not just an bedience to the Lenten rituals (stations of the cross, alms giving, and Easter duty). No, inasmuch as all of these external acts are highly commendable, authentic repentance goes beyond these acts. And that is the bane of Joel’s summons today (Cf. Joel 2:12-18). It is also the hub of Jesus’ exaltation in Matt. 6:1-6. 16-18, when he said that we must not carry out religious acts for public approval, but it should be done more like an internal communication between the believer and his God. Consequently, the desired outcome of repentance is captured in the second reading of today, 2Cor. 5:20-6:2, where St. Paul exclaimed that having experienced the love, mercy and redemption of Christ, we should thus become worthy ambassadors for Christ in the world. St. Paul went further to beg that we should not take for granted the mercy of God, neither should we trivialise his graces upon our lives. But that in all things, places and times, we should act and speak in the same way as Christ would do.

Child of God, I believe that many of us have made very interesting plans for Lent. How to abstain from food, water, T.V shows, alcohol, fruits and other forms of bodily denials. But, as we plan for all these, let us not forget that which is most important: to abstain from any and all forms of sin and to strive to keep our inmost conscience pure as the Psalmist sang in the responsorial Psalm of today, Ps. 51. So my dear brothers and sisters, as you religiously observe the three keys of Lent: *Fasting, Prayers and Alms-Giving*, I want you to add the fourth: abstinence from conscientious wrongdoings.

Oh that today you would listen to his voice harden not your hearts (Ps.95:7-8).

*LET US PRAY* : Lord Jesus, as this year’s Lenten season begins, help me with the grace of holiness. Amen
*The Lord be with you*……. and with your Spirit.
*May Almighty God bless you in the Name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit* ….Amen

*HAPPY ASH WEDNESDAY AND A DIVINE ENCOUNTER LENTEN SEASON TO YOU*

Fada Emmanuel Nnamdi Megwara, MSP.