This Week: Lent II

“Tempted and Tried!”  –Bp. Charles McGuire

The Bishop’s Note
A week and a half of our Lenten season has already passed. It might have seemed slow, but it will be Passiontide and Holy Week before we know it! Don’t let it slip by without doing something extra for Our Lord. Every year we say the same thing during Holy Week: “Lent has gone by so fast and I have let another one pass by without profit to my soul.” We all know that feeling of regret and sorrow. History repeats itself unless we stay vigilant and strive to change. We are beginning the second full week of this sacred season and it is not too late to start putting our resolutions into practice. If we do so right now, we can avoid the monotonous rerun in our end-of-Lent discussions and be able to celebrate with more joy the Easter victory with Our Lord.

Lent is a time of grace. It is also a time of trial. Besides the sacrifices that we plan out for ourselves and those which Holy Mother Church makes obligatory, many others come to us unexpectedly. It has always been this way, in my experience. The devil causes all sorts of mischief during this time to distract us from making good use of it. Often enough, his tactic works. We should prepare ourselves for trial, as we were instructed in last Sunday’s Gospel. If trial comes, we should not allow it to distract us, but we should strive by God’s grace to make good use of it so that it brings us closer to God.

Mexico, the land of Our Lady of Guadalupe, is going through a rough and rocky stretch right now, as I’m sure you have seen in the news. The drug cartels have been setting fires, placing blockades in the highways, and causing all kinds of chaotic disruption. Our priests and their Faithful have not been harmed, thankfully, but the danger is quite close to some of them. Fr. Benegas had to reschedule his return from Argentina to Mexico because of the chaos. Fr. Sebastian said that the cartel set a bus on fire just a half mile from his rectory and that he could not return to Guadalajara from his mission in Colima because the highways were blocked. Fr. Martín said that there is no harm being done in Dos Ríos, but that the nearby town of Orizaba (where he used to lodge Bishop Dolan and now me) is in turmoil. They are very prayerful about this frightening situation and are confident that this will soon die down. May Our Lady watch over our priests and bring all of this to a happy ending.

Fr. McKenna came home from his latest mission trip a little worse for wear. Normally, he isn’t significantly affected by long trips. A day to recover when he gets back and he is ready to go. This time required a little more time, so he is staying with us this weekend and Fr. Brueggemann is replacing him in Dallas. Well, Father does say he is getting old. I kid him about this all the time, but 41 is not old and he still is quite youthful! Young Fr. Brueggemann has spent a lot of time on the road lately. I think he has been gone for the last five Sundays, which is unusual for him.

There is no other significant news to report this week, so I will leave you now, with an assurance of my prayers for a grace-filled Lent. May St. Gertrude, our Lenten patroness, intercede for you…and may we all learn from her example!

– Bishop McGuire

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