The season of Lent has begun. There are five weeks to go before we begin our 2018 Easter Celebrations. This is a time of prayerful preparation for each and every one of us. We are invited to pray a little more; to be a little more generous; to treat our fellow human beings with a little more tolerance and respect. It is essentially about embracing “the good” and avoiding “the bad”.

Today we read from the first Chapter of St Mark’s Gospel. Mark records the first words preached by Jesus in Galilee. The words are these: “the time has come and the Kingdom of God is close at hand. Repent and believe the Good News”.

The “Good News” for the people who heard Jesus was very clear. It meant that goodness, justice and truth would replace the evil, injustice and hypocrisy of the world in which they lived. This victory of goodness over evil, they believed, would be won for them by the Messiah.

Hence, for us, this Lenten season is a time to acknowledge that “the time has come and the Kingdom of God has come” – We are therefore invited to believe this “Good News”.
Lent is a time to experience goodness, justice and truth. If we have that experience during Lent, our Easter celebration this year will be life-changing and we will know, beyond any doubt, that “the Kingdom of God has come”.