". now is the favourable time; today is the day of salvation " 2 Cor 6:2

Penance is often seen as something we do only in the Lenten season. This is not the teaching of our Church. Penance ought to be an ongoing reality in the life of every Christian. This is why our Church has traditional penitential days even outside the season of Lent (Wednesdays and Fridays), on which we are asked to abstain from meat or reduce our portions of food, and even fast.

The call to penance in the Lenten season therefore is more urgent but it is not the only time in the liturgical year we are called to live the penitential life.

What then is penance? In his wonderful post-synodal apostolic exhortation, Reconciliatio et Paenitentia (Reconciliation and Penance), the Pope defines penance as "the inmost change of heart under the influence of the word of God and in the perspective of the Kingdom" (n 4).

All our penitential acts therefore constitute a means - a means to change the stubbornness of the human heart: " But my people did not heed my voice and Israel would not obey, so I left them in their stubbornness of heart to follow their own designs " (Ps 81).

When we pray, when we fast, when we give alms, we do so not for its own sake but so that the whole self becomes a better person before God. This change of heart is effected, John Paul tells us, via God's word.

Lent is therefore an opportunity for us to meditate more intently on God's word. We find this word in the weekday and Sunday readings assigned for the season. All other sources of meditation are secondary to these.

VALUING THE ELDERLY

Meditation on the Lenten readings makes us aware of how much we need to change. This change is first of all personal: we recognise our sins, we ask God to forgive us and for his grace to make us better.

However, it cannot stop there: our conversion must be disposed towards "the perspective of the Kingdom". This means we must not only strive to make ourselves better but make the world a better place.

In his Lenten message (see pg 9), the Pope mentions one way in which our penitential spirit can make the world a better place - by valuing the elderly: "It is necessary to raise the awareness in public opinion that the elderly represent, in any case, a resource to be valued. For this reason, economic support and legislative initiatives, which allow them not to be excluded from social life, must be strengthened".

We need to heed this message because our elderly citizens, including cultural veterans of the past, are often left to languish in obscurity, poverty and loneliness. Even grandparents whose wisdom is priceless to young children far too easily end up in "old age homes", victims of the nuclear family concept that has never been part of our Caribbean landscape.

In this year of the Eucharist, one of the themes being explored in parishes is the Eucharist as "meal". Jesus used meals as a way of including people, not excluding them. He made them feel they belonged; they were valued.

Let us then, purified by the word and nourished by the Eucharist, start today - " the favourable time " - to make our world an inclusive community.