Third Sunday in Lent: The Shame that Leads to Sorrow
by VP
Posted on Sunday March 08, 2026 at 03:00AM in Sunday Sermons
Gerard Seghers: Repentance of St Peter
"Yea, rather, blessed are they who hear the word of God and keep it."—LUKE xi. 28.1. The noble calling to hear and keep the word of God.
2. To our shame, we have often neglected both hearing and keeping it.
3. The shame of having preferred sin and the friendship of the devil to keeping the word of God.
"WE cannot help but be amazed when we hear these words of our Blessed Lord. Can anyone be more blessed than His own Immaculate Mother? No; but her greater blessedness was not simply in being His Mother, but being His worthy Mother. "Yea, rather, blessed are they who hear the word of God and keep it."
This leads us to think, what a noble calling is ours to hear the word of God and keep it. What blessedness should be ours if we had done so; but if we have not done so, what shame and confusion. Where is the blessedness in our careless, negligent, and sinful lives?
Let us look into our souls, and shame will force us to be humble and obtain forgiveness. Hear the word of God! How many a time has the hearing of the word of God been distasteful to us, and we have shirked the opportunity of listening to it. A short, early Mass to avoid a sermon; no prayer-book with us to whisper a word of God, rather distractions rioting in our minds, our thoughts engrossed with all manner of memories and desires, but with no remembrance of any word of God. Spiritual reading! oh, that is left for nuns and priests! Newspapers, novels, ah! yes; our minds are enticed by something else than the word of God. Even if time hangs heavy on our hands, there is no desire to listen to that. That word which should steady our minds, give us pause to think whither all this foolish dissipation of mind will lead us. That word that should nerve us to resolve to do better and give ourselves to obeying God. That word which should give us courage, based on the promises of God, to do our best. With what shame do we find our souls overwhelmed by our sinful neglect in hearing the word of God.
But looking back, perhaps there was a time when we heard the word of God and loved to hear it. Words that lived in our souls when we were young, and which conscience will not let die, and makes them re-echo in times of temptation and sinfulness. Certain it is that we have all heard more than we have kept. That, indeed, is the important, the all-important, part. To have heard and not to have kept! "O Lord, Thou knowest my reproach, my confusion, and my shame (Ps. lxix. 10).
It is when we examine why we have not kept the word of God that we realize our shame. Why did we not? Because we loved and preferred to be careless and negligent, and even sinful. Yes, we have not kept the word of God because of our sins. When we look back and see the worthlessness of our sins, it is then that we are covered with shame and confusion. What good have they ever done for us, or will do for us? And yet we have preferred them to keeping the word of God. That would have made us blessed; our sins have brought nothing on us but shame; even in remembering them we are ashamed, but how much more, terribly more, when we shall stand in judgment for those sins; when the words of the prophet come true, and the Judge shall say: "I will bring an everlasting reproach upon you, and a perpetual shame, that will never be forgotten" (Jer. xxxiii. 40).
And instead of keeping the word of God, we find, on reflecting, that we have given ear to the whispers of the devil. Though we knew in our hearts that he was the father of lies, yet we listened to his seducing temptations, we gave half credence to his boasts of making us free and letting us do what we liked. Yes, in actual fact, we have preferred the mock friendship of the devil to being the faithful ones and blessed ones for keeping the word of God.
The shame of it! for we have despised and rejected the friendship and the love of God. We are the children of God - the good God, our Creator, our Father, Who has endowed us with immortal souls, Who has at Baptism enrolled our names in the Book of Life, Who has given us Himself in the Blessed Sacrament of the Holy Eucharist, Who Himself wishes to be our eternal reward in the Kingdom of His glory. We have despised this good God in not keeping His blessed word, but preferring to sin and live in sin. We are those of whom it is said, "Whose glory is in their shame, who mind earthly things" (Phil. iii. 19).
Let us change our hearts and be ashamed of what we have done preferring sinfulness, the friendship of the devil, to the blessedness of keeping the word of God. To be thus ashamed is a grace from God. It is the beginning of humility, of sorrow, of true repentance. This shame for the wasted past will nerve us to begin now to be in earnest, not to allow Lent to pass by carelessly. This holy shame will make us banish dissipation of mind, the love of vain and earthly pleasures, and turn our hearts all to God. This shame will fill our hearts with holy resolve and courage. We are poor indeed in God's sight, for there is nothing but shame to clothe our souls as we kneel before Him. But God is not only good, not only powerful, but God is merciful. And when He beholds our hearts grieving in shame over our wasted life, His mercy will bless that shame into repentance, and a contrite and humble heart God will not despise." Short Sermons on the Epistles & Gospels of the Sundays of the Year By Rev. Fr. Francis Paulinus Hickey, O.S.B. 1922
Second Sunday in Lent: Duties of Lent
by VP
Posted on Sunday March 01, 2026 at 03:00AM in Sunday Sermons
anonymous: A Hermit Saint Doing Penance
"God has called us... unto sanctification in Christ Jesus our Lord."—I THESS. iv. 7.
1. Our sanctification the work of Lent.
2. The means: Fasting, self-restraint.
3. Alms-giving: Christ's poor alive and dead.
4. Prayer: the direct and most important means.
"OUR heavenly Father has granted us to start another Lent, during which
"let us amend and do better for those things in which we have sinned
through ignorance; lest suddenly prevented by the day of death, we seek
time for penance, and be not able to find it." And the means by which we
can amend and do better are plainly set before us during Lent. Each of
us knows them; and each of us, if he followed his selfish inclinations,
would fain find excuse not to use them. Fasting, alms-deeds, and prayer
are not duties that human nature welcomes. But these are the means unto
sanctification to which we are called.
There are so many reasons and excuses found for the non-observance of
fasting, that very few are found to take any heed of the obligation. But
the necessity of doing penance is still urgent upon us. And if we
cannot endure the hardships that our forefathers bore humbly and
penitently—are we less sinful, less prone to evil, have we less to make
atonement for than they had? And is there no means of doing penance
other than depriving ourselves of food? Is all that we drink as
necessary to sustain us as meat and bread ? Would it not be real fasting
to do without some of our pleasures and pastimes, cards, theaters, and
the rest? Let us try the Rosary and attendance at the Stations of the
Cross for a change. We may be unwilling, granted; but otherwise how
shall we answer to God that we used the means to our sanctification?
Self also is ready with excuses when there is mention of alms-deeds.
"Charity begins at home," and other well-known pleas immediately find
utterance. But we are called unto sanctification, and not slavishly to
obey the dictates of selfishness. The Holy Scriptures tell us: "Give
alms out of thy substance, and turn not away thy face from any poor
person; for so it shall come to pass that the face of the Lord shall not
be turned from thee. For alms deliver from all sin and from death, and
will not suffer the soul to go into darkness. Alms shall be a great
confidence before the most high God, to all them that give it " (Tobias
iv. 7, 12). And did not our Blessed Lord Himself note and commend the
widow's mite, for He sees and blesses the good intention of the kindly
heart. Remember His words: "Give, and it shall be given to you, good
measure and pressed down and shaken together and running over shall they
give into your bosom. For with the same measure that you shall mete
withal, it shall be measured unto you again " (Luke vi. 38).
It may seem most unlikely to us that we shall ever need the alms of
others; and it may be so in this life, but the day will come that we
shall be needy and poor. When our soul, friendless and alone, shall be
imprisoned in purgatory till the last farthing be paid, that is the hour
when with bitter regret we shall bewail our selfishness in neglecting
the poor and needy, and "Take especially the souls of the faithful
departed. pity on me, at least you my friends!" Yes; but how seldom did
we heed that cry from others amidst the pleasures and occupations of our
life on earth! Prayers, a holy Communion, a Mass offered for the
departed—what a blessing they will prove to us hereafter ! Give, and it
shall be given to you."
The Lenten duties that we have considered-viz., fasting and almsdeeds -
have reference to ourselves and our neighbors; the third great
duty-prayer refers directly to God. "Bless the Lord, O my soul, and
never forget all He hath done for thee; Who forgiveth all thy
iniquities, Who redeemeth thy life from destruction, Who crowneth thee
with mercy and compassion" (Ps. cii. 2, 4). To use this greatest means
of our sanctification, as it should be done, not so many more prayers
are needed-though in Lent there should be an increase-as an intensifying
of our devotion during prayer. We must throw our hearts into our
prayers. We must remember Whom we are addressing.
Lowly adoration of our heavenly Father, our Creator, with an ardent
offering of ourselves to do His blessed Will, and thus inherit the
Kingdom of heaven, should commence our prayer. And that our prayers may
be acceptable, our sins should be always before us," that He may fill
our hearts with true sorrow, for " a humble and contrite heart" God will
not despise. Then, lest we should fall away again, let us pray for help
and strength. God loves thus to be implored, and He is our hope and
strength in all our necessities.
There is another part of prayer in which we are often
wanting: thanksgiving. Our Father loves to be thanked. Thanksgiving is
the work of the angels, their eternal and blessed occupation. And we
poor sinners are permitted to join our voices with theirs to praise and
glorify and thank the good God. St. John the Evangelist, when blessed
with a vision of heaven, heard the angels cry out, "Glory and honor and
benediction! Thou art worthy, O Lord our God, to receive glory and honor
and power, because Thou hast created all things, and for Thy Will they
were and have been created" (Apoc. iv.). Should our prayers aspire to
this? Yes, in very deed, we can thank and glorify God in union with the
prayers of Mary Immaculate and the very prayers of the Sacred Heart of
our Lord Himself. For we are "called unto sanctification in Christ Jesus
our Lord.”
These are the means by which we can sanctify Lent: prayer, fasting, and
alms-deeds. We have need to make good use of this holy time. It is a
duty, and an imperative duty. And how consoling it will be to us, when
we come to die -perhaps before the next Lent- that we have made good use
of this holy time." Source: Short Sermons on the Epistles & Gospels of the Sundays of the Year By Fr. Francis Paulinus Hickey 1922 (Second Sunday in Lent)
