{"id":2988,"date":"2010-02-22T23:58:40","date_gmt":"2010-02-22T12:58:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/imaginarydiocese.org\/bishopjohn\/?p=2988"},"modified":"2010-02-23T20:19:46","modified_gmt":"2010-02-23T09:19:46","slug":"lent-tiger-woods-and-mary-mackillop","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/imaginarydiocese.org\/bishopjohn\/2010\/02\/22\/lent-tiger-woods-and-mary-mackillop\/","title":{"rendered":"Lent: Tiger Woods and Mary MacKillop"},"content":{"rendered":"

There has been much comment about Tiger Woods’ apology for his adultery: is the apology sincere or hype or hoping to regain sponsors? Whatever your conclusion of his motive, and surely we must be generous in attributing the highest motive – genuine reconciliation, the words of the apology are profound<\/a>. Note his recognition that temptation lurks so very near and is so very alluring,<\/p>\n

I thought I could get away with whatever I wanted to. I felt that I had worked hard my entire life and deserved to enjoy all the temptations around me. I felt I was entitled. Thanks to money and fame, I didn’t have far — didn’t have to go far to find them.<\/p>\n

I was wrong. I was foolish. I don’t get to play by different rules. The same boundaries that apply to everyone apply to me.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

These words are particularly apt for reflection at the beginning of Lent.<\/p>\n

Lent is a time for review of life, for reflection and examining the inner places of our heart in the day to day struggle to be totally reliant on and committed to God.<\/p>\n

The Rector of Devonport noted Tiger Woods’ apology\u00a0made due to his behaviour and\u00a0the news of Mary MacKillop’s recognition as a saint<\/a> by the Roman Catholic Church\u00a0in commenting insightfully on the significance of the daily decisions made by\u00a0of each of us.\u00a0Mary MacKillop, like all of us, was faced by daily decisions about the pathway\u00a0she would walk. Each decision we make shows something of who\u00a0we are.<\/p>\n

Yesterday’s (Lent 1)\u00a0Gospel reading from Luke 4 on the temptations of Jesus Christ are set at the beginning of Lent to show us who Jesus is – the promised Messiah who will exercise his Messiahship in complete accord with God’s will. What do Jesus’ responses to these testings demonstrate? – they demonstrate his\u00a0person: who he is.<\/p>\n

And so for us, the decision we take when faced by\u00a0temptation\u00a0reflects both\u00a0the person we are and the person we will become.\u00a0<\/p>\n

May this Lent be a time of reflection and revision of life in accord with God’s will.<\/p>\n

May the Holy Spirit so work within us that we be increasingly transformed\u00a0into the image of Christ.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

There has been much comment about Tiger Woods’ apology for his adultery: is the apology sincere or hype or hoping to regain sponsors? Whatever your conclusion of his motive, and surely we must be generous in attributing the highest motive … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[5],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/imaginarydiocese.org\/bishopjohn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2988"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/imaginarydiocese.org\/bishopjohn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/imaginarydiocese.org\/bishopjohn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/imaginarydiocese.org\/bishopjohn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/imaginarydiocese.org\/bishopjohn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2988"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"http:\/\/imaginarydiocese.org\/bishopjohn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2988\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2995,"href":"http:\/\/imaginarydiocese.org\/bishopjohn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2988\/revisions\/2995"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/imaginarydiocese.org\/bishopjohn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2988"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/imaginarydiocese.org\/bishopjohn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2988"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/imaginarydiocese.org\/bishopjohn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2988"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}