Sunday 9 March 2025

1er Sunday of Lent – ​​Year C

Homily by Father Emmanuel Schwab

1st reading: Deuteronomy 26,4-10

Psaume : 90 (91),1-2,10-11,12-13,14-15ab

2rd reading: Romans 10,8:13-XNUMX

Gospel: Luke 4,1:13-XNUMX

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I can well imagine that some people thought they wouldn't have had to wait 40 days to get hungry! In fact, this is a very valuable indication, because when you fast completely, the body being lazy, after three or four days it stops asking for food and feeds itself with something other than external food: it draws on its reserves, and the sensation of hunger disappears. But when it returns after 40 days, it's: you eat or you die... because there are no more reserves. As if Jesus had wanted to put himself in a situation of extreme weakness to experience the need for salvation. Now, one does not save oneself. When a high priest says: "He is not even able to save himself" (Mt 27,42:15,31; Mk XNUMX:XNUMX), he is right; it is God who saves. Taking advantage of this great weakness, the enemy attacks: Jesus must eat, or he will die. Then he proposes that he put his power as the Son of God at his own service, that is, to give life to himself and no longer to receive it from the Father. In his way of refusing by quoting Scripture, Jesus feeds on the words of the Father: "Man does not live by bread alone"… It is not by his own power that Jesus responds, but by the power of the Father which is present in his word. Jesus came for the salvation of humanity, Jesus came to take back from the devil the power that he acquired through the sin of men. Then the devil offers to give it to him; he is right in saying: “All this has been given to me, and I give it to whomever I wish. So you, if you bow down before me, will have it all.” But it is not from the devil that Jesus comes to receive the world, it is from his Father through the offering of his own life. And here again, he feeds on the word of God: " You shall worship the Lord your God and serve him only. And since Jesus came thus to give his life, it is proposed to him to do so with great splendor. He places it on the pinnacle of the Temple: if you are the Son of God, manifest this filiation, look at what is written; since you feed on the word of God in Holy Scripture, listen to what Scripture says. But Jesus has the understanding of the Scriptures and he answers again: “You shall not put the Lord your God to the test.”. And, the evangelist tells us, he thus exhausts all forms of temptation. Other evangelists will tell us that the angels come to serve Jesus and that he already receives his life from the hands of the Father.

These temptations of Jesus in the desert, at the beginning of his public life, are there to strengthen us, so that we understand that it is normal to encounter temptation in our lives, that it is normal to be put to the test.

The people of Israel experienced that God saves. Slavery in Egypt, then the exodus from Egypt, is a fundamental moment in the life of the people of God. A moment so important that, in the second version of the Decalogue, in the book of Deuteronomy (Deut. 5), the Sabbath day will no longer be referred to as the seventh day of Creation, as it was in chapter 20 of the book of Exodus, but will commemorate the Exodus, the exodus from Egypt, as if, in this act of salvation, it were a new creation.

And the people of Israel live in this faith that God saves, but how? Saint Paul, in the passage from the Letter to the Romans that we have heard, tells us: “Whoever calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”. But let us not reduce salvation to going to Heaven after our death. Let us understand that salvation is every act of God that intervenes in our lives, acts by which he snatches us from the power of sin and death, he snatches us from the slavery of sin. Every act in which we discover that we have received from God more freedom, more capacity to love, that we grow in faith, in hope, in charity; this is salvation in progress. Yes, of course, there is the fact of being snatched from hell and going to Heaven! But this does not happen just at the moment of our death, it happens throughout our lives. And how does this happen? By calling on the name of the Lord. But how can we know the Lord without being with him? For this, we need to be with the Word of God. It is the Word that is powerful.

We face many temptations in our lives. The Greek word, which we translate as "temptation," can also be translated as "trial," and our lives encounter trials. When we read Saint Therese of the Child Jesus, we are always a little embarrassed because it is obvious to her that trials are given by God, and that it is through them that we grow. But before Therese, many others have spoken about it.

Beginning of chapter 5 of the letter to the Romans: “Moreover, we boast in the affliction itself, because we know that affliction produces perseverance; and perseverance produces proven virtue. — that is to say, by persevering, one acquires virtue — proven virtue produces hope; and hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us." (Rom 5,3:5-XNUMX).

Saint James, beginning of his Letter: “Consider it all joy, my brothers, when you encounter trials of every kind. You know that the testing of your faith produces endurance, and endurance must be accompanied by perfect work, so that you may be perfect and blameless, lacking nothing.”. (James 1,2:4-XNUMX)

Saint Peter, at the beginning of his first letter: “You will rejoice, even though you will be afflicted for a little longer by various trials, which will test the worth of your faith, which is much more precious than gold, which is destined to perish but tested by fire, so that your faith will receive praise, glory, and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ. You love him without having seen him; in him, though you do not yet see him, you believe and rejoice with joy inexpressible and full of glory, because you are about to receive the salvation of souls at the end of your faith.” (1P 1,6-9).

They are unanimous in saying that the trial is ultimately a grace which should rejoice us - yes indeed! - because it allows our faith to grow, our virtue to be tested and it opens us to hope.

But to fight in trials, we need the Lord Jesus, and for that, we must know him. This is what we said in the opening prayer of the Mass: May we during this Lent progressions in the knowledge of the mystery of Christ, that we may know Jesus better. And how can we do this if not by frequenting the holy Gospels? And here, I am speaking in particular to the young people in sixth grade who are here today, suggesting that they take, for example, 10 minutes each day from their screen time to read a Gospel continuously. Take whichever one you want, but 10 minutes a day you read the Gospel. And if you say to yourself: I have trouble concentrating… you take a nice notebook, and for 10 minutes each day, you copy the Gospel by hand—by hand so that it sinks in through the movements—each time asking the Holy Spirit to help you know Jesus better: know him better to love him better, love him better to follow him better. (I say this for the sixth graders, well… but if others want to steal the idea from them, it is copyright free!) This knowledge of Jesus will help us to lead the spiritual warfare. Thérèse tells us how she wages this battle in the very great trial of darkness that she experiences, which she enters at Easter 1896. She speaks of the temptations that she has against the faith and she says:

[Jesus] knows well that while I do not have the enjoyment of Faith, I at least try to do its works. I believe I have made more acts of faith in the last year than in my entire life. At each new opportunity for combat, when my enemy comes to provoke me, I behave bravely, knowing that it is cowardice to fight a duel, I turn my back on my adversary without deigning to look him in the face; but I run to my Jesus, I tell Him that I am ready to shed the last drop of my blood to confess that there is a Heaven. I tell Him that I am happy not to enjoy this beautiful Heaven on earth so that He may open it for eternity to the poor unbelievers. So despite this trial which takes away all my enjoyment, I can nevertheless cry out: — "Lord, you fill me with joy in all that you do." (Ps. XCI). For what greater joy is there than to suffer for your love?… (Manuscript C 7r)

What is interesting about this trial is that she says she is ready to undergo them for poor sinners, for “poor unbelievers” as she says. How, in our spiritual combat, how, in our combat of conversion, how, in our fight against the enemy—that is, the devil—against temptations, how do we do it? Not only for ourselves, but for the whole Church and even for the whole world; because every time we win a victory, it is the whole Church that is strengthened, and it is the whole world that is better for it.

Finally, this battle must never be fought alone, but always through Jesus, with Him, and in Him. And I will end by quoting this very important passage from chapter 6 of Saint Paul's letter to the Ephesians, which you are no doubt familiar with, on the armor of battle. Paul tells us:

Draw your energy from the Lord —not in you, not in your courage, not in your strength, not in your intelligence: in the Lord. And for that, Thérèse tells us, we must be weak, small— Draw your strength from the Lord and from the strength of his power. Put on the equipment of war given by God, so that you can stand against the schemes of the devil. For we do not wrestle against people of blood and flesh, but against the rulers of this dark world, the principalities, the dominions, the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly regions. For this, take the equipment of war given by God ; so that you will be able to resist when the day of evil comes, and do everything possible to stand firm. Yes, stand firm, having around your waist the belt of truth, wearing the breastplate of righteousness, and your feet shod with the readiness to proclaim the gospel of peace, and never taking off the shield of faith, with which you will be able to extinguish all the flaming darts of the Evil One. Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, that is, the word of God. In all circumstances, may the Spirit give you prayer and supplication. Stay alert and be diligent in supplication for all the faithful. (Eph 6,10-18)

If we have a childlike and playful soul, Lent is a beautiful, joyful time that opens up before us.

Amen

Father Emmanuel Schwab, Rector of the Shrine