prayer for the day.

O God, whose glory it is always to have mercy: Be gracious to all of us who have gone astray from your ways, and bring us again with penitent hearts and steadfast faith to embrace and hold fast the unchangeable truth of your Word, Jesus Christ your Son; who with you and the Holy Spirit lives and reigns, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
(from the liberti Lent & Easter 2012 prayerbook & the Book of Common Prayer)

relfections.

For the sinful self is not my real self, it is not the self You have wanted for me, only the self that I have wanted for myself. And I no longer want this false self. But now, Father, I come to You in your own Son’s self… and it is He who presents me to You.

-Thomas Merton, from “Thoughts in Solitude”

Recalling and confessing our sins is like taking out the garbage: once is not enough.

-Cornelius Plantinga, Jr., from
“Not the Way It’s Supposed to Be: A Breviary on Sin”

more on the why and how of Lent here.