ACI is proud to present its first Lenten see-judge-act Gospel enquiry program designed by Dr Pat Branson for use in parishes and other settings. Official launch Monday 28 February 2022 (details below).
“Christians around the world celebrate Lent, which is forty days of fasting and prayer and doing good deeds. They do this in the name of Jesus,” Pat writes. “He fasted and prayed for forty days before beginning his mission. And he commissioned his followers to carry on his mission to the world.
“Every year, Christians spend the season of Lent as a time of preparation for the mission they will carry out in the year ahead and for the rest of their time on earth. Therefore, it seems only right and appropriate that we reflect on our mission by means of the gospel.
“What is that mission? Recently, I discovered the following statement about the mission of every person. The truth of our
faith, wrote Cardinal Joseph Cardijn, is that we are:
called by God Himself to a magnificent divine destiny, which is the sole reason for [our] existence, the sole end of [our] temporal and eternal life. “Not beasts of burden, machines or slaves; but sons of God, collaborators with God, heirs of God.” And this divine destiny is not to begin after death; no, it becomes incarnate in [our] temporal life Because we are prone to forget this truth, we need Lent to remind ourselves of God’s love for each of us. Lent is a time of conversion and reform, both individually and communally.
“The forty days are spent listening to the Word of God, reflecting on its application to our lives and to the society in which we live, and then looking for ways of bringing others to Christ through all that we do each day.
“This Lenten programme makes use of the method used by the Young Christian Workers Movement (YCW) and the Young Christian Students Movement (YCS) and Cardijn communities around the world. These movements were formed by Cardinal Joseph Cardijn and they continue to use his method for discovering the presence of God in their lives and guiding their apostolic life. The method, which emerged from his support for workers, has three steps or stages: SEE, JUDGE and ACT. These stages form what is commonly referred to as a “review” or an “enquiry.”
“Thus, what we are about to engage in for this season of Lent can be referred to as a ‘Gospel Review’ or a ‘Gospel Enquiry.’
“Preparing this program brought home to me more than ever before the presence of God in every moment and situation in life, no matter how dark and chaotic things might seem,” Pat concludes. “I find myself looking for God in the dark spaces and finding God there, like the prodigal father, waiting and longing for us to return.”
REGISTER FOR THE OFFICIAL LAUNCH AND PRESENTATION OF THE PROGRAM VIA ZOOM
Official Launch Monday 28 February 2022, 7pm AEDT
DOWNLOAD THE PROGRAM
If today you hear his voice (Australian Cardijn Institute)
