Death and Him that Conquered It

 Eighth Sunday in Ordinary Time
    As we enter into Lent this Wednesday, we enter into a time of penance.  We begin our observance of Lent with the words, “Remember you are dust, and to dust you shall return.”  And throughout Lent we give things up in order to die to our will.  We fast, we abstain, and we enter into a time of making do with less.  Why?  Why all this negation?
    Our little sacrifices are meant to remind us of the one big sacrifice that Christ underwent for our salvation.  But do we really understand salvation?  Do we know from what we were saved?  Do we want to be saved daily?
    St. Paul talks about that which is corruptible and that which is mortal, and talks about death and sin.  This is something that we don’t talk about a lot in modern Catholicism, but it’s important.  Because if we don’t understand the sorry state we were and can be in, then we don’t appreciate the gift of incorruptibility, immortality, and victory that our Lord Jesus Christ won for us.
    We have certainly grown up in a society that says that everyone is basically good, and everything is basically alright.  That’s one view of the world, but it’s not the Catholic, Christian, or Jewish worldview.  Yes, God created all things good, as we heard in Genesis, but through Adam and Eve’s sin, everything in creation was corrupted.  Death entered the world, and not simply the death that signals the end of life, but eternal death, eternal separation from God.  
    And that was not simply for Adam and Eve, it was for everyone who came forth from them, that is, everyone.  We don’t enter into this world on the path to heaven; we enter this world on a path to hell, because we are separated from God.  We belong to sin, and sin means death, which is the opposite of God, who is Life.  All we can produce is bad fruit.  Even the best of us–Abraham, Moses, David, Isaiah–were all still bound in sin and could not enter into eternal life, no matter how good a life they lived.
    This is the victory that St. Paul was talking about for death.  Death claimed every person of the human race before the Incarnation.  It was as if everyone was in a prison, by humanity’s own making, and the warden was the devil.  So many came so close to getting out, only to be dragged back in.  

    But, the victory of Christ was the opening of the prison gates by one who died, but who was not under its penalty.  Christ knew no sin, and yet suffered the penalty of sin so that we would not have to.  He was able to transform the bad fruit into good fruit.  He freed us from sin and death.  And He did this by His Death and Resurrection.  And He imparts that Death and Resurrection to us through Baptism, and through all the Sacraments, especially the Most Blessed Sacrament of the Eucharist.  
    So without Baptism, without the Death and Resurrection of Christ applied for us and accepted by us, we are still in that prison; we are still subject to eternal death.  Without Christ, nothing we do is meritorious and helping us get to heaven.  With Christ, even the smallest sacrifices that we make help us to accept eternal salvation that Christ won for us.
    But while Baptism frees us from the prison, we can, by our decisions, freely walk back in.  We would consider it crazy for a prisoner who was just released from prison to walk right back and close the cell door on him or herself.  But that is what we do when we sin.  
    And so, as we get ready for Lent, we do those small sacrifices that show Christ that we are grateful, but we are also training ourselves not to turn back to sin.  The things that we give up, the extra penances and charitable works that we do are meant to help us be closer to Christ and keep us free with Him.  We give up stuff that reminds us of how bad prison is, so that when we go throughout our day we reject the path back into prison and accept the freedom that Christ wants for us.  
    So, as we prepare for the beginning of Lent on Wednesday, we are not preparing for a Catholic diet.  We are not preparing for a random, 40-day period where we give up stuff just because it’s what we’ve always done.  We are not preparing simply for a season.  We are preparing ourselves to continue in the freedom that we received in Baptism and that we receive in the Eucharist and through the other sacraments we have received.  We are preparing ourselves to recognize and resist the ways in which Satan seduces us to come back to his prison and be his slaves.  We are preparing ourselves to stay close to Christ and the victory He won, so that, in Christ, we can say, “Where, O death, is your victory?  Where, O death, is your sting?”  And “thanks be to God who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ,” whom we will have the opportunity to worthily receive as we continue towards the climax of the Mass, the consecration and reception of the Eucharist.