Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
“Behold, now is a very acceptable time; behold, now is the day of salvation” (2 Cor 6:2). With the Apostle Paul’s words from the second reading for Ash Wednesday, we will begin the season of Lent in this Jubilee Year 2025. St. Paul’s words to the church at Corinth about an “acceptable time” echo our Lord’s own words in the synagogue at Nazareth and the prophet Isaiah’s words from centuries earlier. With these words I also began my message to the faithful last Advent on the Jubilee Year: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me … to proclaim a year acceptable to the Lord” (Luke 4:18–19; see also Isa 61:1–2). What do these words mean for the Church of Detroit living in the year 2025? What does it mean to say that this year and this time are somehow acceptable to the Lord?
First, our time of jubilee becomes an acceptable time because God provides us this time to accept his grace, his indescribable gift of mercy. In 2 Cor 6:1, just before the passage quoted above, St. Paul appeals to the Corinthians “not to receive the grace of God in vain.” To receive the grace of God fully, then, is to accept the full life of God, which he shares with us in the Paschal Mystery — that is, the dying and rising of Jesus Christ. Our participation in Christ’s Passion and Resurrection is what we prepare for during the coming season of Lent.
This Lent, in the spirit of the Jubilee Year, each of us can look for opportunities to die to self and live for God. What first comes to mind is the dying to self that occurs as we approach the Sacrament of Reconciliation, especially if we have been away from it for some time. It is true that sin brings us nothing but sorrow, but at the same time, sorrow for sin (or contrition) is a healing remedy. There is no sin so damaging that it cannot be forgiven by a humble and contrite confession; there is no wound so painful that it cannot be healed by the wounds of Jesus, the Divine Physician; there is no soul so lost that it cannot repent, turn back, seek God’s mercy, and be welcomed again into God’s household at the threshold of hope that is the confessional door. I invite all the faithful in the Archdiocese of Detroit to examine their consciences, identify places for conversion from patterns of sin, seek out a priest, and celebrate the Sacrament of Reconciliation during this Lenten season as a way to prepare more fully for the joys of Easter. Now is the time to accept the grace of God that is available to those who “ask, seek, and knock” (see Matt 7:7-8; Luke 11:9-10).
Second, our time of jubilee becomes an acceptable time because in this time Jesus accomplishes his work in us to make us acceptable to God. At every Mass, when the gifts are prepared on the altar, the priest invites the faithful to pray that his “sacrifice and yours may be acceptable to God, the almighty Father.” To this, we respond: “May the Lord accept the sacrifice at your hands for the praise and glory of his name, for our good and the good of all his holy Church.” Jesus’s self-offering to his Father is for our good and is made present every time the sacrifice of the Mass is offered. Christ’s self-gift is his complete offering to the Father, “the Sacrifice of perfect reconciliation” (Eucharistic Prayer for Reconciliation II), the only sacrifice acceptable to God to restore humanity to his friendship. But at the Mass, we do not passively observe how God reconciles us to himself in Christ Jesus; rather, in the liturgy, we are made partakers and active participants in Christ’s sacrifice. The priest prays that in the Eucharist Christ would also “make of us an eternal offering to you,” the Father (Eucharistic Prayer III); imperfect as we are, we become part of Jesus’s perfect self-offering. Many in the Archdiocese of Detroit are preparing to receive the Eucharist for the first time at the Easter Vigil or in the Easter season. These brothers and sisters of ours hunger for communion with Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament. We can join them in prayer this Lent that Jesus will increase our hunger and desire for him, too, so that in communion with the Eucharistic Lord, we might become a sacrifice acceptable to the Father.
Finally, our time of jubilee becomes an acceptable time because this is the time for us to accept more willingly the sacrifices and penances that we adopt in Lent and those that come our way in daily life. When we unite our sufferings to Jesus’s sufferings on the Cross, he continues his saving work in us. This is why St. Paul tells the Corinthians that the “acceptable time” is also the “day of salvation” (see 2 Cor 6:2). This Lent, by abstaining from distractions (e.g., the use of smartphone apps or social media) or by forgoing certain food and drink (fasting), we demonstrate our dependence on God and our need for detachment and conversion from sin. Fasting increases our desire for God and empties us, so that God can fill us and sustain us with his grace. Many other works of mercy and penance — encouraged by the Church in the Jubilee Year for those seeking the plenary indulgence — also provide us with opportunities to sacrifice some of our time or preferences to minister to others: namely, visiting the sick, prisoners, the elderly, the disabled, those in need or difficulty, or those experiencing loneliness, hopelessness, or despair. We become pilgrims of hope in this Jubilee Year when we are compassionate, when we “suffer with” those with whom we share this pilgrim journey.
The hopeful pilgrim’s journey traces the Lord’s path to Calvary; yet that journey does not end with the Cross, but rather with the joy of the Easter sunrise, the joy of the empty tomb, and the joy of the gospel proclamation, “He is not here, but he has been raised” (Luke 24:6). This Lent, it is my prayer that you might accept both the Cross and the Resurrection in your life, as well as any particular sacrifice Jesus has called you to make so that you will be more closely united with his sacrifice. As the Church prays in one antiphon before Our Lady’s Magnificat: “By your trusting acceptance of trials, you will gain your life, says the Lord” (see Luke 21:9).
Sincerely yours in Christ,
The Most Reverend Allen H. Vigneron
Emeritus Archbishop of Detroit and Apostolic Administrator
