Lent, the Conference, and Spiritual Housecleaning

Recently I joined with some friends to help prepare a parsonage for an assistant pastor and his wife who were coming to their new church. The house required a lot of work to get it ready for habitation: new kitchen cabinets and appliances, upgrades to the bathrooms, fresh coats of paint in all the rooms, and lots of general cleaning. It was a messy but joyful job, but it reminded me of my call as a Catholic man to allow the Lord to do a spiritual housecleaning in my life each Lent, and every day of my life.

Such inner renovations are not always pleasant for men, but they are always necessary if we are to come to a deeper understanding of true manhood in light of the mystery of redemption that has played itself out in the world. Our yearly men’s conference is a good time to do that. And Lent can serve as a reminder that we are ever pursuing a path of inner restoration as we work in fellowship with our brothers in Christ.
 
The Messes We Make

Just as the choices the men made to restore the old house were based on the needs of the new occupants and the goals of the church, we too must decide how we are to remake our lives as men of God. In the house, some poor choices like the closed-in second floor porch, had to be left as is. Others, like the awkward entrance to the master bath through a master bedroom closet needed to be closed up and redirected through a non-loadbearing wall. Bright African orange walls needed extra coats of paint to clean them up. Some rooms needed to be gutted and rebuilt, while others needed only minor changes. In the end, the house was remade into a place where the pastor and his helpmate could live well and conduct their ministry in a welcoming way.

As a man, I have made many choices that brought poor results. I know that, as Christ works in me, I sometimes have to accept the damage of past mistakes and move on as I allow Christ to tear down the remnants of failure and rebuild my life from the start. I know I need the cleansing of God’s forgiveness to cover the ugliness of my sin. Sometimes my faulty thinking needs a simple spiritual upgrade and other times it needs a complete overhaul as the old is torn out to make way for the new.

The pain of past hurts can be remade through the grace-filled rebuilding power of transformative truth. In those inner rooms of selfishness and pride, we must open up our hearts to allow God’s love to create a new space where our lives can once more serve a higher purpose. Ultimately the reconstruction plan is subject to the loving will of the One who is remaking us all into better men.
 
This Old House, This New Journey

Like Lent, the Connecticut Catholic Men’s Conference is a yearly reconstruction project for those willing to submit to the loving touch of the divine Carpenter. The words of the speakers, the fellowship of broken brothers, and the sacraments of confession and Eucharist serve to rebuild us from the inside out. As we go through the days of Lent, and as we prepare through the year for the conference, we are taking God’s beautiful blueprint that he has laid out in the Liturgy and the sacraments, and in our fellowship with other men, and coming together as a Body of believers to draw strength in Christ. The divine carpenter renovates our lives into a building that reflects his love to all the world.

Men, are you allow the Scripture readings of Mass to direct your gaze inward, where you can come face to face with the clutter and chaos of sin and selfish living? Will you cast off what is unusable, remodel what remains solid, and submit to God’s daily plan of renewal for your lives? Will you visit the sacraments of confession and Eucharist often so that God can do the work necessary to restore your lives?

Through the Eucharist, the plan for our redemption unfolds before us as we discover our original worth in the eyes of our Savior and receive the grace we need to rebuild our lives from the inside out. In the sacrament of confession, we make a careful examination of the false fronts and faulty soul repairs we have done in desperation that need to come down. We are members of a Church, founded on the rock-solid foundation of Christ, rising up as a tower of strength for all the world to see. As we demolish the strongholds of pride, anger, lust, fear, and selfishness, we make way for the One who will rebuild us according to the eternal plan unrolled before the universe. Only in Christ, our cornerstone, can this sacred rebuilding take place.
 
Swept and Put in Order

At the start of Lent, we receive the image of the cross upon our foreheads, reminding us that we are made of dust and called to turn from the meaningless of sin and embrace the Gospel. As men, this call is especially important, for we know that we must lead well. Each year at the Connecticut Catholic Men’s Conference, we are challenged to live out that same Gospel call as we embrace the apostolate that Jesus has given to us. But it must begin as we allow Christ to enter into the inner realms of our soul, sweep out the refuse and clutter of the old occupant, and fill those rooms with rare and beautiful treasures that we discover as we walk the journey of Lent and life.

As you prepare for the conference this year, let all your words and deeds become a daily discipline of self-denial and an ever-deepening commitment to the renewal and restoration of your souls. Like Lent, may your journey through the year and your commitment to the conference carry you to the cross and challenge you to walk all the way to Calvary’s lonely hill, not only at Easter, but in every moment of your lives.

Instead of “giving up” things for Lent, consider immersing yourselves in this time, and in every moment of your life, as you contemplate the timelessness of Christ’s all-powerful, sacrificial love and his call on your lives to live out your apostolate. As you spend time at Mass and participate in the sacraments, commit to losing yourself so that you can be filled with the One who is the great I AM. Let every moment of Lent and all the days that follow transform you from faith to faith, so that, one day, your dim sight will reveal the glorious vision of the new man that, in Christ, you will become.
 
The Old Made New

The parsonage was beautifully transformed into a comfortable and practical living space for the young pastor and his wife, though I knew there were still many projects left undone. But that is the beauty of coming to call a sacred space our own. We accept the challenge of spending ourselves in joyful labor as we remake our homes and our hearts into places that reflect the beauty and the love of the Savior who comes to dwell within both. Seeing the commitment of those who worked so hard to prepare the parsonage is a living reminder that I am part of a Body of believers working alongside me as together we remake our lives and the life of the Church into a worthy place where Christ may make his home.

As you move through the days of Lent, I pray that you will allow the Lord to do a spiritual housecleaning in your life, to tear down the old so that he may replace it with the new. I pray too that you will consider coming to this year’s Connecticut Catholic Men’s Conference on October 19 ^th at St. Paul Catholic High School in Bristol, Connecticut, where you will discover so much more than you could ever hope to see. May you find joy in the revelation of God’s glory, day by day, as you travel this path of renewal and restoration that leads to the resurrection, this Easter, and every day of your lives! God bless.