Saint Mark’s Gospel has, by far, the shortest account of Jesus’ time in the dessert before he began his public ministry. He even skips all the details of his temptation. But, his is the only gospel which mentions the fact that, while out in the wilderness, Jesus was “with the wild beasts”.<\/p>\n
A phrase like this might conjure-up images of terror and fright. After all, wild beasts might not make the best of companions to one alone in the elements. Bring on Satan’s temptations, perhaps, but let’s leave the wild beasts out of it! Yet, St. Mark mentions it in a “matter-of-fact” sort of way which makes no big deal of it.<\/p>\n
Maybe this is because animals, which we know have a sense awareness beyond our capacity, could already notice what it took people a long time yet to find out:\u00a0 Jesus, as our Savior and Redeemer, comes to restore the fallen nature of humanity and, not just for humans, but for all of creation.\u00a0 Thus, all of nature shares in this great act of God’s love…including the wild animals. Genesis tells of the harmony present at creation and how this was thwarted through sin and compounded with Adam and Eve’s expulsion from paradise.\u00a0 But, Jesus comes to conquer sin and is the living symbol of that harmony restored.<\/p>\n
Maybe we could take a tip from the wild beasts… Maybe we could turn to Jesus to calm our wayward passions, our inclinations toward sin, the “wildness” that is within us.\u00a0 Maybe we could learn from them to stay close to Jesus always, for, when he left they certainly went back to being “wild beasts”.\u00a0 Maybe this Lent we will remember that we, too, can more fully share in the restoration of our fallen nature through Christ by more actively participating in the Sacrament of Penance and the reception of Holy Communion.\u00a0 And maybe we can remember the best part of all, that, unlike the wild beast, we can have Jesus with us all the time.\u00a0 It’s up to us, though, to do what’s necessary to make it happen.<\/p>\n
Fr. Eric Orzech<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I Sunday of Lent<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":1864,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[8,17,18],"tags":[65,108,109,101],"class_list":["post-1863","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blog","category-strona-glowna-najnowsze","category-strona-glowna-slider","tag-comment","tag-gospel-wild","tag-i-sunday-of-lent","tag-orzech"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n