15 March 2019
Friday in the First Week of Lent
We are not nearly as worthy as we imagine. We may say to ourselves “I have never killed anyone,” but who can say “I have never called someone a fool”? Reflecting on today’s gospel, Ratzinger wrote that to take these words seriously, one “moves over from party politics to reality. The beautiful black and white into which one is accustomed to divide men changes into the gray of a universal twilight.”
Our tribes and divisions do not make us nearly as pure as we think. Under the microscope, every human heart is gray. Not black, not white, but gray. We have elements of good within us, but also elements of evil, and the labels we try and give ourselves will not change that. If we want purity, we must turn to God. Lent helps us turn to God with greater trust, not only so that we may have a more satisfied life, but so that we may finally have the purity and goodness we long for.