4th Sunday of Lent

Our readings for the 4th Sunday in Lent are:

1. Joshua 5: 9a, 10-12
   
2. Psalms 34: 2-3, 4-5, 6-7
3. 2nd Corinthians 5: 17-21
   
4. Luke 15: 1-3, 11-32

• Slavery comes in many forms
• Last week we heard God speaking to Moses through the burning bush that God had heard the cries of His people, how they were being oppressed and afflicted, and He was coming to rescue them from the slavery.  Maybe Pharaoh's taskmasters were the least of their worries.
• What are some things that someone could be a slave to: money, fame, power, appreciation, security, ...?
• Are all of these things intrinsically good, bad, neither, both, ...?
•  How do you know that you're a slave to something?
• How do you break those chains?
• Who do you need to be helping you break those chains?
  

• A beacon of hope
  
• What kind of an audience would find your life story encouraging?
• Do you think that God has been pretty good to you?
  
• Based on your experience, what would you tell someone who is truly needy, oppressed, marginalized about God that would encourage them?
  

• Reconciliation revealed
  
• Reconciliation is probably a rather fluffy term for most of us.  Particularly when it comes to God.
• When you are unreconciled to God, what is going on in your life.
• What does that feel like?
• How do you reconcile with/to God when that happens?
• Is that reconciliation strictly an act engaged in by you & God, you and the person/people that you wronged, you and a priest, you and everyone that the priest stands for, you and the rest of the cosmos, ...?
• How do you know when your done?
• What makes you think that reconciliation has an end?
  

• Act of contrition
• Supporting another person is not easy.  Being a supportive parent can be agonizing.  A colleague of mine asked me today "is 11 years old too young for a girl to be wearing makeup?"  His wife had texted him a picture of their daughter in makeup, and my colleague was shocked, alarmed, and disoriented all at once, and wondering what to do next.  I didn't have a good answer.  It made me wonder how God reacts to some of my actions.
• Think of a time when you needed to show someone real love, and you had no idea how.
• How did you decide what to do?
• How did it turn out?
• Would you do things any differently if you were in that situation again?
• How do you think God makes such decisions?
  

• Preparation for Reconciliation

1. Where is God inviting me into greater freedom this Lent?
2. How can I encourage even one oppressed person  today?
3. How can I help others to embrace the reconciliation that is already theirs?
4. Where is God calling me to love someone impossible?

Shalom and a blessed Lent to you!