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MESSAGE OF HIS HOLINESS POPE FRANCISFOR LENT 2022
“Let us not grow tired of doing good, for in due time we shall reap our harvest,if we do not give up. So then, while we have the opportunity,let us do good to all” (Gal 6:9-10)
Dear Brothers and Sisters,
Lent is a favourable time for personal and community renewal, as it leads us to the paschal mystery of the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. For our Lenten journey in 2022, we will do well to reflect on Saint Paul’s exhortation to the Galatians: “Let us not grow tired of doing good, for in due time we shall reap our harvest, if we do not give up. So then, while we have the opportunity (kairós), let us do good to all” (Gal 6:9-10).
1. Sowing and reaping
In these words, the Apostle evokes the image of sowing and reaping, so dear to Jesus (cf. Mt 13). Saint Paul speaks to us of a kairós: an opportune time for sowing goodness in view of a future harvest. What is this “opportune time” for us? Lent is certainly such an opportune time, but so is our entire existence, of which Lent is in some way an image. [1] All too often in our lives, greed, pride and the desire to possess, accumulate and consume have the upper hand, as we see from the story of the foolish man in the Gospel parable, who thought his life was safe and secure because of the abundant grain and goods he had stored in his barns (cf. Lk 12:16-21). Lent invites us to conversion, to a change in mindset, so that life’s truth and beauty may be found not so much in possessing as in giving, not so much in accumulating as in sowing and sharing goodness.
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