Breathe deeply. Spend some time with your family. Have dinner with a friend. Take a walk. Put your feet up. Rest. You need to experience some of the new life and renewal you have been preaching or teaching to others over this last week. Thank you for all that you do.

What struck me so deeply is how, if we're not careful, we celebrate with palm leaves and children: the Palm Sunday. And then a week later, we have Easter and the Easter celebrations and the Resurrection. But what struck me is how little attention we sometimes give to the reality of Jesus’ suffering and death.

“What is the gift that has been given to you? What is it that you have received that must be passed along and move through you? You have been given a gift that has been cultivated and shaped by hundreds of people throughout your life and thousands of experiences…”

“One of the images that is stuck in my mind from this last week was a photograph of a train station in Poland where there is a lineup of strollers—so that arriving refugees fleeing Ukraine will find these strollers and be able to immediately have a place for their children…”

Robert Schnase, Bishop of the Rio Texas Conference, shares Thomas Merton’s Prayer of Discernment as we enter into this season of Lent.