Most Rev. Mark E. Brennan
Dear faithful of the Diocese of Wheeling-Charleston,
We have begun the holy season of Lent with ashes on our foreheads and hope in our hearts. Lent’s goal is to prepare us spiritually for the great feast of Easter, when we celebrate the Lord Jesus’ resurrection from the dead in which we find our own hope for immortality.
We know from experience how easy it is to succumb to temptations to sin and let our spiritual lives sink into routine or indifference. We need a wake-up call and Lent gives us one. Like the baseball players who brush off the rust of a lethargic winter to get back into shape for the new season, we practice prayer, fasting and almsgiving in Lent to open our veins to God’s grace and allow it to transform us into more faithful disciples of Christ.
If you have a habit of daily prayer, keep it up and consider how you might extend it either by spending more time with the Lord or enriching your prayer by meditating on Scripture. If you have not been praying, start now. Give the Lord at least 15 or 20 minutes a day at the time you find most convenient. (For many of us, that time is early in the morning before daily work or study begins.) Just place yourself before God, briefly present to him your concerns and projects of that day, invoke him slowly and repeatedly by saying “Father,” “Jesus” or “Spirit”, and then be quiet. God’s Spirit in you will do the rest.
As for fasting, Pope St. Gregory the Great said, “The principal fasting in Lent is fasting from sin.” Reflecting this understanding, Pope Leo XIV in his Lenten message for 2026 urges us to “refrain from words that offend and hurt our neighbor:” harsh words, slander, rash judgments and speaking ill of others when they cannot defend themselves. Bodily fasting is useful, not as an end in itself – a Lenten fast is not for the purpose of losing weight! – but for curbing our desires for the things of this world and moving us to hunger and thirst for righteousness [Matthew 6:6]. Pope St. Leo I said: “What we forego by fasting is to be given as alms to the poor,” underscoring our responsibility in charity to share what we have with those in need.
Almsgiving may take many forms. Giving money to a poor family to help them buy groceries or to a pantry which offers them a bag of food is one form but so is tutoring a child struggling with math or reading, visiting or calling a sick neighbor or relative or befriending an immigrant afraid of being separated from his or her spouse and children. The heart of almsgiving is overcoming self-concern in order to do good to others. Do unto others as you would have them do unto you [Matthew 7:12].
If these counsels for keeping a good Lent sound familiar, they are from the Lord’s words in the Gospel we heard on Ash Wednesday. Jesus himself gives us the way to make our Lent
fruitful in holiness and good works. Commit now, if you have not already done so, to give your soul a vigorous workout in the gymnasium of Lent so that you will be in good shape when Easter comes. Then you, with the newly baptized and confirmed, will rejoice in the power of God’s love to make his divine life pulsate more vibrantly in you.
Sincerely in Christ,
+Mark E. Brennan
Bishop of Wheeling-Charleston