FEBRUARY 18TH 2024, 1ST SUNDAY OF LENT (YEAR B)

We have made a covenant of love and loyalty with God. Have we kept it? Lent’s forty days are given us to recall our relationship with the one who made us and loves us beyond all telling. The first reading tells how, after the flood, God established the rainbow as a sign of his overarching love. But a covenant is made between two parties; in the psalm we pray to be true to our pledge even as God is true to us. Peter’s letter, part of a baptismal homily, links Jesus’ death and resurrection with Noah’s faith and our baptismal washing, when we pledged faith to God. Baptism does not work automatically; we must keep our promises with God’s help. Jesus himself serves as our pattern. After his baptism by John, Jesus spent forty days in the desert under the strong impulse of the Spirit. There he was tempted; there he confronted evil and conquered it, as we must. Baptism does not remove us from struggle and temptation; the Holy Spirit, who inspires the baptized, draws us to sorrow for sin and to a deepened faith in the Good News of God’s rule.

Sunday Mass Book for Canada