Lent is time to see others through eyes of Christ: Pope

By CINDY WOODEN

Special to The B.C. Catholic

VATICAN CITY (CNS) – Especially with fasting and almsgiving, Lent is a time to learn how to see others with the eyes of Christ and to express His compassion for the poor, Pope Benedict XVI said.

“In the face of the terrible challenge of poverty afflicting so much of the world’s population, indifference and self-centred isolation stand in stark contrast to the gaze of Christ,” he said in his message for Lent 2006.

The Pope’s message was released Jan. 31 at the Vatican. For Latin-rite Catholics, Lent begins this year on Ash Wednesday, March 1.

In the message, the Pope encouraged Catholics to try during Lent to see and to react to those suffering around them with the same attitude Jesus showed in St. Matthew’s Gospel, which says, “Jesus, at the sight of the crowds, was moved with pity.”

Pope Benedict said responding to the needs of others like Christ meant not only meeting their material needs, but also offering them the Gospel.

“It is quite impossible to separate the response to people’s material and social needs from the fulfilment of the profound desires of their hearts,” he said.

While poverty and underdevelopment are “an outrage against humanity,” he said, economic programs alone cannot provide everything necessary for full human development.

Development also “involves the proclamation of the truth of Christ, Who educates consciences and teaches the authentic dignity of the person and of work,” the Pope said.

Each and every Christian has an obligation to be personally involved in promoting development with gifts of time, money, prayer and action, he said.

“It is clear that no economic, social, or political project can replace that gift of self to another through which charity is expressed,” he said.

Pope Benedict said that in their work for peace and justice some Christians mistakenly have thought “they should first improve this world and only afterward turn their minds to the next. The temptation was to believe that, in the face of urgent needs, the first imperative was to change external structures.”

In consequence, he said, “‘believing’ was replaced with ‘doing.’”

The greatest gift a Christian can give to another is the gift of faith in Jesus, Who promises victory “over every evil that oppresses us,” the Pope said.

Especially during Lent, he said, Christians must try to model themselves on Jesus, bearing “the material and spiritual needs of their neighbours.”

Each year, the papal Lenten message focuses on charity and is distributed by the Pontifical Council Cor Unum, which promotes and co-ordinates Catholic charitable activity.

Msgr. Karel Kasteel, Cor Unum secretary, told Vatican Radio Jan. 30 that the message touched many of the same themes treated in the Pope’s encyclical Deus Caritas Est (God Is Love).

The Lenten message, he said, “is addressed specifically to the faithful who want to make Lent a fruitful period for the development of their spiritual lives.”

The complete text of the message can be found on the Vatican web site.

In the Roman rite, in Canada, Ash Wednesday and Good Friday are days of fasting and of abstinence from meat. The Canadian bishops urge that these days be proclaimed and practised in the parish community as days of true penance. Pastors are asked to invite and encourage their people to do special penance on these two days.

These “privileged” forms of penance are especially recommended during Lent since they are based on the teaching of the Gospels (fasting, almsgiving, prayer, works of mercy) or because of their traditional value among the people of God (abstinence from meat.)

In their guidelines, the bishops point out that Christian fasting “obtains its full meaning when we deprive ourselves of food in order to be more open for prayer, to share more in the suffering of those who are starving, and to save money to give to the poor. Fasting among Christians is a penitential discipline intended to open our hearts to God and others, a means of purification and spiritual liberation, and a witness of the depth of our faith.”

The law of abstinence from meat is binding on those who are 14 and older, while the law of fasting binds those 18 to 59.

The bishops especially remind parents and educators of their duty to introduce children gradually to the understanding and practice of penance.