Every Liturgical season presents us with its own special symbols. Lent offers its signs that help us enter more deeply into the sense of the season.

First of all, we have just used the ashes to initiate the Lenten observance. Ashes tell us that something is past, gone, destroyed. We want to let go of negative aspects of our life--sins, temptations, bad experiences, failures to love, etc. Wildfires in nature, though harmful to our habitations and constructions, clear the way for new growth. There are pinecones that only release their seeds after a fire. Then, with the undergrowth cleared away, the new seedlings have a good chance for life. Clearing our lives of the negative can be tough, even painful. Without this baptism of fire we can never go forward to new, deeper life.

The color purple--not the film--is the color of penance. It calls to mind our sinfulness, need of repentance, and the availability of God's generous forgiveness. It is traditionally a royal color. If I get my life in order, then God is King of my life--its center, its deepest meaning.

The lack of usual decorations indicates that we are in a different time. Less or no flowers, less ornamentation open us into the "desert experience". As has been said here before, in the desert I listen better to the quiet voice of God because there are few distractions. Maybe I see things that were always there but were clouded out by flowers and other features. Maybe I see through to what matters most: the tabernacle, the altar. Maybe I notice or recognize my neighbor in the pews.

Late in Lent the statues can be covered with purple cloth. We don't want to forget the saints, but again we concentrate on what is most fundamental. We look straight ahead at the Lord, the Savior. And we think of what the loss of Jesus was like, the days He was in the tomb. As His Image became hidden we hide some of those images that remind us of Him. In "losing" the Lord we lost all that was meaningful, all that really mattered. Voluntarily cutting legitimate images from our life reminds us of the transitory nature of life and that in the end God alone remains.

We try to highlight the cross or crucifix during Lent. The apex of our life is the self-sacrifice of Jesus in love for all of us. His saving passion and death bring us new life, forgiveness of our sins, and the promise of an eternity of peace and joy. It was a very high price to pay. But it was done with great love and commitment. And it does not end with the cross. Without the resurrection the crucifixion is just a very nasty death. The rising of Jesus from the dead was foreseen long before His sacrifice was accomplished. For us there are smaller and larger crucifixions in our daily lives. Every loss, every failure, every fall is like a small death and often means letting go. Every triumph, every success, every good act or temptation resisted is an experience of the resurrection, leading to our definitive experience at life's end.

In this vein, nature itself offers Lent and Easter symbols. The "death" of winter is followed by the "resurrection" of all life in the spring. Where there appeared to be no life, no hope, all of a sudden new life and fresh color appear. An egg the looks like a cold stone suddenly opens and new life pops out.

Look around. See the signs. Get the message and share it. We are surrounded by God's love and lessons.