Liturgy and Worship Reflections

We often think of Lent as being 40 days long, but if you were to count the days from Ash Wednesday through Holy Saturday, you arrive at 46 days instead… What's that about?

Mass practically begins with a “penitential act.” It’s the first order of business, right after the Sign of the Cross and a basic greeting. It says, “first things first”—let’s acknowledge our sins. We should not discount that immediacy. The Penitential Act signals an indispensable element of right worship and liturgy: man’s moral standing before his God. God is holy; man is not. That dissonance is the barrier to right worship because it is the barrier to the divine-human relationship.

“The main current of Lent must flow through the interior man, through hearts and consciences. The essential effort of repentance consists in this. In this effort, the human determination to be converted to God is invested with the predisposing grace of conversion and, at the same time, of forgiveness and of spiritual liberation.”