Ash Wednesday 2024

Most Reverend José H. Gomez
Archbishop of Los Angeles

Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels
February 14, 2024

My brothers and sisters in Christ,¹

In this holy season of Lent, God is calling us to make a new beginning and to go deeper in our relationship with him.

We hear our Lord’s voice in the first reading today, from the prophet Joel: “Even now, says the Lord, Return to me with your whole heart, with fasting, and weeping and mourning.”

So, as I was saying, this journey of Lent is a journey of returning, it’s a journey of coming home.

We walk this journey of Lent because we are invited to do so, personally, by Jesus.

God is saying to you and to me today: Come back to me, humble yourself, acknowledge your need for God. Open your heart and you will know how much God loves you.

And as we know, the traditional spiritual practices of Lent are prayer, fasting, and almsgiving, which means doing works of mercy and love.

And as Jesus explains to us today in the Gospel, these are three ways that we can draw closer to God and experience his presence in our lives.

And three times today he tells us: “Your Father who sees in secret will repay you.”

So my dear brothers and sisters, during this Lent, we have this invitation that is delivered personally from the Lord himself. He is inviting us to renew our awareness of his presence in our lives, through these practices of prayer, fasting, and works of mercy and love.

And as we know, prayer is not complicated, as we know. But we need to make more time to do it. That’s what Lent is for.

And as we know, prayer is just a personal conversation with God. So, when you pray, try to settle your mind and heart and be quiet. I have to say it’s a challenge in our society nowadays because we have so many things coming to all of us at the same time.

But it is a moment where we are asked to just rest in your Father’s loving gaze. And we have to listen to his voice in our heart.

Also a good practice during Lent — I mean it’s a good practice during every day of the year — but at least during Lent it might be a good resolution to try to come to Mass during the week. Daily Mass is a special opportunity for us to experience God’s presence in our lives.

And during Lent, we also want to connect with God through fasting.

Fasting, as we know, doesn’t mean starving yourself. It just means learning to live with less, trying to be less selfish, making little sacrifices, little offerings to God.

Then almsgiving. That means, as we know, just being generous, opening our hearts, thinking about the needs of others first; finding little ways to serve people.

So I think this is a simple and beautiful way to live this season of Lent. And also, as we know, this is our Christian life.

Because in this way, we become more and more like Jesus. We learn to trust in God and to depend on him.

This is what our life is meant for. We are here to be changed, to be transformed, to be converted.

So dear brothers and sisters, let’s accept the invitation that Jesus makes to us this Lent. Let’s make a fresh start.

Let’s take this beautiful opportunity that we have to grow in our relationship with Jesus, to improve ourselves, to be converted more and more in the image of Jesus!

And as we enter into our Lenten journey, let us entrust ourselves to the Blessed Virgin Mary, the Mother of Mercy.

May she help us to answer with a generous heart, our Lord’s invitation to return to him with all our heart. Amen.