Today kicks off a new season in the Church called Lent. We spend about 5 weeks to prepare ourselves for Holy Week when we focus on the Passion, Death and Resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ. It is not a day of obligation. In the Philippines, many catholics flock to churches to get the mark of the cross on the forehead with ashes from the burned leaves of the palms used the previous Easter season. Ashes remind us of penance or spirit of sacrifice. It reminds us of conversion and the task we all have to mend the tears in the fabric of our lives with God, the others and with ourselves. The gospel today proposes the three forms of penance to fix these resulting gaps from our sins. Sin is the culprit. Since we offend God we need to repair it with these forms of penance, namely, fasting, alms giving and prayer. These fix our problems with ourselves, with the others and with God, respectively. Listen to the homily.
