Readings:

Lv. 19:1-2, 17-18; Ps. 103; 1 Cor. 3:16-23; Mt. 5:38-48

“Be perfect, just as your heavenly Father is perfect.” Jesus’ words from today’s Gospel echo what the Lord God spoke to Moses: “Be holy, for I, the Lord, your God, am holy.” This is precisely what we should be focusing on as we prepare for the Season of Lent. This Wednesday is Ash Wednesday, a day we remember our mortality and acknowledge our need for God to deliver us from a world of sin and death to eternal life in heaven. So, be holy, as the Lord, our God, is holy.

Let’s do a little word study. I’d like to focus on two words: “holy” and “perfect”. The Hebrew word for holy in the Book of Leviticus is qadowos, which carries within it the idea of being set apart, unique. Certainly, this is the case with God, who is uniquely set apart from us—we are not God, nor is God any one of us. Yet, God has chosen us, through baptism, to be adopted sons and daughters, uniquely set apart not from Himself, but rather, from the world. Not only that, God has chosen to dwell within us, making each of us a temple of God. This should be most apparent to us whenever we receive Holy Communion. St. Paul reminds us that the temple of God is holy, and if we are God’s temple, we too are holy, that is set apart for a purpose.

Our Gospel passage is the continuation of the Sermon on the Mount, where Jesus encourages his disciples, all of us, to offer no resistance to one who is evil, but rather to go the extra mile. When was the last time we went out of our way for a friend? When was the last time we went out of our way for an enemy? How different might the world be if people stopped holding back their charity? It takes a special kind of grace to put up with someone we can’t stand. But, this is precisely the person with whom Jesus is encouraging us to go the extra mile. And when we do go that extra mile, just think of how much more opportunity we will have to share with others our Christian way of life, our love of God, our faith, our peace. How many more people might we lead to Jesus because we walked with them just a little farther?

The following teaching is similar: We are to love our enemies and pray for those who do us wrong. God shows no partiality in sharing His love and mercy with us. Every human being is made in the image and likeness of God. Jesus says the sun rises on the bad and the good, and rain falls on the just and the unjust. That is to say, if the sun were to represent truth, all of us have access to it; if the rain were to represent life-giving water, all of us have access to it. So, it stands to reason, then, that we ought to allow the light of Christ, and the waters of baptism, to shine and flow out of us, his chosen ones, to those who may not realize that they need Jesus, too.

Getting back to our word study about holiness. Remember, to be holy is to be set apart, chosen, unique. Jesus says, “Be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect.” The Greek word used for “perfect” here is teleioi. This word carries within it the notion of purpose, from the root telos, which means “that for which something was made.” For example, a chair is made for sitting, an altar is made for sacrifice, and a human being is made in the image and likeness of God for a purpose: to attain perfection. In other words, our Christian life is a process of becoming more and more, in our own unique way, a reflection of the Creator within us. The true image of God is Jesus Christ, and our life’s goal is to imitate Christ, who dwells in us. By so doing, we will be the face of Christ to others; by so doing, we realize that going the extra mile is an opportunity for others to encounter Christ in us; by so doing, we become set apart from the world and its sinfulness so that we can be transformed by God.

Our transformation is not complete. We are like clay in the potter’s hands, being shaped and molded into the person God is calling us to be. And the first step of allowing ourselves to be shaped by God is knowing our purpose, our teleioi, our perfection. I believe question 6 of the old Baltimore Catechism describes this best. The question is: Why did God make you? And the answer: God made me to know Him, to love Him, and to serve Him in this world, and to be happy with Him forever in the next. This is our holiness, our perfection, our call. So be holy as the Lord your God is holy; be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect; be the person God made you to be.

How might we, as Catholics, carry out God’s will for perfection in our lives? Well, throughout the forty days of Lent, might I suggest the great hallmarks of Lent: prayer, fasting, and almsgiving. According to the precepts of the Church, all Catholics under the age of 60 are required to fast on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday, as well as abstain from meat on Ash Wednesday and all Fridays during Lent We are to have no more than one full meal throughout each fast day. As for all other Fridays during Lent, no meat.

Next, this might go without saying, but it bears mentioning that our prayer ought to be something significantly different during Lent. Perhaps we will wake up earlier each day to spend time praying the Rosary; or maybe come to daily Mass more often; it could also be a devotion to the sacrament of Reconciliation once a week; stations of the cross on Fridays; or to visit the Church just to be close to the Lord.

Finally, while abstinence applies to no meat on Fridays, might there be something else we can give up? Is there something we have been hooked on? Maybe too much social media, YouTube, streaming, texting, gaming, vegging? Now is the time to let go of the distractions that keep us from being close to God. By letting go, we allow ourselves to be transformed by the grace of God. We may also realize how unimportant those things really are. So, be holy, as the Lord, our God, is holy.

And now, as we turn to the Eucharist, to receive the very source of our holiness, let us reflect on the ways in which, together, we are the Body of Christ on earth, a sign of the Lord’s dwelling with His people, holy temples of God.