April 3, 2022
How hopeful are the readings for today!! We are given assurance that God remembers not our past offenses. Paul tells the Philippians that ‘forget what lies behind … strain for what lies ahead.’ Meaning, we need to let go of our past offenses, too, just like God lets go of our offences. Isaiah promises that God is doing something new. That rivers will flow where dryness was. Psalm 126 speaks of ‘torrents in the southern desert.’ In the Gospel today, the author of John presents us with the woman caught in adultery. Jesus does not condemn her, instead he sends her off with the instruction to sin no more. Her slate is wiped clean much like the writing in the dust he does, that will be wiped away by wind and footprints. Her sins are forgotten. So are ours. We are the only ones who can, but shouldn’t, remember our failings, thus refusing the newness offered. The waters of renewal flow over us as often as we seek them. Luckily for us, those waters flow and never go dry. Only we go dry, but God makes all things new. Maybe celebrating the sacrament of Reconciliation before Easter is a good thing to do this Lent.