Living in the Spirit this Lent
By John Graveline, Director of Parish Life
February 15, 2026
“I will sprinkle clean water upon you, and you shall be clean from all your uncleanness, and from all your idols I will cleanse you. A new heart I will give you, and a new spirit I will put within you; and I will remove from your body the heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. I will put my spirit within you, and make you follow my statutes and be careful to observe my ordinances.”
Ezekiel 36:25-27
Led by the Spirit
This Wednesday is Ash Wednesday, the beginning of our annual Lenten journey to prepare ourselves to enter more intimately into the Paschal Mystery of Jesus’ death and resurrection, the central mystery of our Christian faith. Many Catholics associate the Holy Spirit with the Easter Season, and rightfully so. The Gospel of John recounts that Jesus breathed his Holy Spirit on his disciples on the evening of Easter Sunday. (20:22) In The Acts of the Apostles, Jesus promises his apostles a baptism with the Holy Spirit before he ascends to his Father. (1:5) In the next chapter, he keeps his promise when they are filled with the Holy Spirit on Pentecost. (2:1-4)
However, if we listen closely, Lent is also a powerful time for us to experience the Holy Spirit. On the first Sunday of Lent, we will hear that Jesus was “led by the Spirit into the desert to be tempted by the devil.” On the fifth Sunday of Lent, Saint Paul will remind us of the importance of “living in the spirit” as opposed to living in the flesh. “Whoever does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him.” (Romans 8:9) Finally on Good Friday, we will hear John’s Gospel describe Jesus’ death as “he handed over the spirit.” (19:30) Therefore, we see that Lent begins, ends, and is permeated with the Holy Spirit’s role in Jesus’ life and death and with the manner of living associated with his followers.
As the season of Lent invites us to enter more deeply into the celebration of the Easter mysteries, we will prepare to share in the joy of those who will be baptized into our communion of faith this Easter in our parish, diocese, and universal Church and to wholeheartedly renew our own baptismal promises. During Lent, we ask for a renewal and deepening of the Holy Spirit that we received at our baptism so that our preparations for Easter are fruitful. Otherwise, we run the risk of observing Lent as a time of reinforcing our own willfulness, doing our spiritual “push-ups” if you will. The good deeds done and evil avoided in the Christian life always begin with the prompting of God’s Holy Spirit that dwells within us through baptism and are a response to that gift. The more active we allow the Holy Spirit to be in our lives, the more we will be aware of our need to repent of the sin in our lives and to reform our sinful behavior. In The Gospel of John, Jesus promises to send his Advocate, the Holy Spirit, and the Advocate will “convict the world in regard to sin and righteousness and condemnation.” (16:7-11) This is because the indwelling of Holy Spirit is the very definition of holiness for the Christian, and sin cannot co-exist with the all-holy God that has come to dwell within us through our baptism.
Missing the Mark
The concept of sin comes from Hebrew terms that connote “missing the mark” as in archery. When we engage in sinful behavior, we “miss the mark” of what it means to be fully human, what it means to live out our covenant with God which we entered into in our baptism, and fulfill our dignity as adopted daughters and sons of God that we received through the Paschal Mystery of Christ. Ultimately, sin “misses the mark” of our greatest calling, to live in loving communion with God and neighbor. The more the life of the Holy Spirit grows within us, the more apparent the incongruity of our sinful behavior becomes. This, of course, does not mean that the Holy Spirit comes to make us feel bad about ourselves. Rather, the Spirit of Love heightens our awareness of the damage of sin and calls us to ever greater trust in the mercy, forgiveness, and reconciliation of God. That is why Lent is a most opportune time to receive the Sacrament of Reconciliation and to practice the giving and receiving of forgiveness with those in our life from whom we are estranged.
A renewal of the Holy Spirit this Lent will also lead us to deeper spiritual awareness. Our modern life pulls us in so many directions, and the risk is that we lose the peace of spiritual centeredness. With so many technological distractions, our lives can become filled with what theologian Romano Guardini called “superficial eventfulness.” The traditional Lenten practices of prayer, fasting, and almsgiving, when done under the initiative and guidance of the Holy Spirit, can call us back from shallow busyness to what Guardini called “the deep clarity of inner vision.” In other words, we can be reoriented toward putting the most important relationships with God and others in life in their proper place. When guided by the Holy Spirit, our Lenten disciplines lead us to greater spiritual depth, maturity, and fruitfulness.
“The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control . . . and those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. If we live by the Spirit, let us also be guided by the Spirit.”
Galatians 5:22-25
Growing in the Spirit
This week, we have a special opportunity to grow in the Holy Spirit right before the beginning of Lent. We are blessed as a parish to welcome Sarah Hart for two concerts, one on Sunday evening and one on Monday evening. Both evenings will be unique but unified in the theme of “Fruit of the Spirit: Planted, Thriving, Yielding.” We gratefully receive the gift that Sarah is giving us by sharing her spiritual and musical gifts that she offers back to God through her ministry of evangelization through beautiful and uplifting music. May this opportunity be a spiritual catalyst, opening up each member of our parish to the gift of the Holy Spirit given to us through baptism so that our Lent will bear fruit as we seek to grow in more intimate communion with our Lord Jesus through a deeper communion with his Paschal Mystery the upcoming Lent and Easter seasons.
John
Correction: Last week, I referenced a prayer entitled Radiating Christ. The prayer card in my prayer book attributes it to St. Theresa of Kolkata (Mother Teresa). While she and her Missionaries of Charity sisters do regularly pray this prayer, I learned upon further research that it was composed by St. John Henry Newman, the 19th century English Cardinal and Doctor of the Church.