REND YOUR HEARTS
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Rend your hearts, not your garments, and return to the Lord, your God (Joel 2:13).
Jesus’ call to conversion and penance, like that of the prophets before him, does not aim first at outward works, “sackcloth and ashes,” fasting and mortification, but at the conversion of the heart, interior conversion. Without this, such penances remain sterile and false; however, interior conversion urges expression in visible signs, gestures, and works of penance (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1430).
WHAT DID YOU GIVE UP FOR LENT?
This perennial question seems to occupy a prized place during Lent, and the answers we often hear are chocolate, alcohol, meat, smoking, and the like. But what if we heard responses like this: