Sexagesima Sunday stands at the Church’s solemn threshold to Lent, a warning and a mercy from Holy Mother Church. By silencing the Alleluia and clothing the altar in violet, the Church reminds us that the Christian life is not comfort but combat. In the Epistle, St. Paul lays bare the cost of fidelity—sufferings, humiliations, and weakness—yet he glories in them, for “power is made perfect in infirmity” (2 Cor. 12:9, Douay-Rheims). The Church teaches us here that grace does not flourish in ease, but in humility and perseverance. As pre-Lenten history shows, these Sundays were established to awaken souls from spiritual negligence and prepare them to enter Lent as disciplined soldiers of Christ, not passive observers of faith.
In the Gospel, Our Lord’s Parable of the Sower confronts each soul with a serious question: not whether the seed is good, but whether the soil is ready. The Word of God bears fruit only in hearts that hear, keep, and endure with patience (Luke 8:15). From the Traditional Catholic and Vatican in Exile view, the crisis of our age is not a failure of the Gospel but a failure to cultivate the soul through doctrine, discipline, and obedience. Sexagesima Sunday calls both clergy and faithful to examine their interior ground, uproot distractions and compromise, and prepare now—before Lent begins—to receive Christ’s Word deeply, so that it may bear lasting fruit unto salvation.
