“The awareness of the wonders that the Lord carried out for our
salvation should lead our minds and hearts to gratitude to God. Fully living
out our Baptism … means not becoming inured to the situations of degradation
and poverty that we encounter when walking the streets of our cities and towns.
There is the risk of passively accepting certain types of behavior and of not
marveling at the sad realities that surround us. We grow accustomed to
violence, as if it were a normal part of our daily news; we get used to seeing
our brothers and sisters sleeping in the streets, as they have no roof to
shelter them. We are used to refugees who search of freedom and dignity, but
are not received as they should be. We get used to living in a society that
claims to be able to do without God, in which parents do not teach their
children how to pray or how to make the sign of the Cross. This inurement to
forms of behavior that are not Christian, that are the easy way, anesthetize
the heart!”
-- Ash Wednesday audience, March 5, 2014
No comments:
Post a Comment