Good morning on this Mardi Gras as we prepare to enter the season of Lent in Cath-O-landia! To any of my other brothers and sisters in Christ who honor the season, I pray it is a time of deepening prayer and spiritual fruitfulness. The Gospel of Ash Wednesday is the same one every year, with Jesus’ admonition to grow in prayer, practice generosity to the needy, and to fast and abstain in such a way that those practices glorify God and draw as little attention to ourselves as possible. The real invitation for me during Lent—in growing as a disciple of Jesus—is to embrace new practices and habits that endure past the season. There is no abundant discipleship without discipline.

While I am away from social media and most of the internet during Lent, I will be praying for all of you—neighbors known and unknown to me—that I have met in this wonderful medium of technology. I am so grateful for Locals and Substack and all of you I have met because of these communities. There is plenty to be black-pilled about in the current situation and how fragile our comfort and relative prosperity are if things go south, but knowing good people, wherever you find them, is a blessing.

With all the anxieties of modern life, we do live in amazing times, and technology can open the door to personal relationships and friendships. You don’t need many friends, but to have none and be content with it is to be sentenced to your own thoughts and attitudes, which will eventually become disconnected and more than likely delusional. Good friends can lovingly ground us and call us back from the excesses of emotional derangement and fixation on the stupid ideas we have mistakenly thought of as insightful. With love and a little laughter, a good friend can help us reexamine things and avoid the pitfalls of our own echo chamber. They can love us as we are and help us become more than we are without them. Good spouses know and experience this. Disciples of the Master know this: there is a love and friendship with Him that is a unique fellowship if we allow Him to call us to deepening conversion and spiritual/emotional maturity. I don’t claim to be very far along my own climb, but I am striving to hear His voice and follow His lead. Happy Mardi Gras, my friends, and Blessed Lent tomorrow! Peace & Prayers, your friendly digital neighborhood Padre. See you at Easter!

OUR MASTER

Our Master is a worker and we work with Him.
Boisterous is His mirth and we laugh with His laughter.
He beats His drum and we march.
He sings and we dance in its tune.
His play is of life and death.
We stake our joys and sorrows and play with Him.
His call comes like the rumbling of clouds;
we set out to cross oceans and hills.

Tagore, Rabindranath. Heart of God: Prayers of Rabindranath Tagore