Starting with the story of creation and original sin and continuing with the call of Abraham, the gift of water to the Israelites as they traveled the desert, and today's story of the choice of David as king, the first reading for each of the Sundays of Lent has provided us with a basic outline of the important events of salvation history: God's offer of relationship to his people, and their response. These stories remind us that God's offer of love to us is continuing and unconditional, especially as we see it in the life of Jesus.
From "Lasallian Identity" by Brother Antonio Botana, FSC: "We live the experience of the Light which God has placed in our hearts in order to enlighten the young students who are the objective of our mission. We are mediators for them with the God of Salvation. In the same way that the mission leads to experience of the God of Salvation, we enter the field of education to contemplate the reality of young people suffering from poverty. We do this with the merciful eyes of God, full of confidence that each person is capable of growth and renewal. This experience of the ebb and flow of regard for the God of Salvation and regard for the young we have to save is known in Lasallian terminology as the spirit of faith and of zeal. On this journey of mission and contemplation, we discover ourselves and realise the need of cultivating the spirit which makes sense of all we do and of all that we are. That is how the Lasallian spirituality evolves, a spirituality of mediation. We ourselves are links between the God who saves and the poor who need to be saved. And the need we have of finding reasonable answers for the poor, causes us to have recourse to God for the gifts we need in our mission. Through it we discover the kind of community we have to form and the kind of education we have to impart as God's work, and we recognise ourselves as representatives of Jesus Christ."
The season of Lent is designed, in part, to give us the time and opportunity to reflect on God's call to us, and on how we have responded to him. But as Lasallians, our call is also to educate. As Brother Antonio Botana explains, this call leads us not only to know and share God in our own lives, but to see the reality of the poor, the marginalized, the underserved. Our response is to be the bridge between the God of salvation and those who live that reality. Our response calls us to take the gifts and unconditional love of God for us, and use them to bring salvation to those in educational need.
Lent invites us to review our response to God. As Lasallian educators, we come to know that our response to God is our response to our students. Is the grace and mercy of God that is shared with us shown in our actions, our belief, that each of our young people is capable of growth, of renewal, of salvation?
Live, Jesus, in our hearts!