Reading your way through Lent--updated!

What are you doing for Lent?  (Ash Wednesday is just one month away!)

This Lent my community will be revisiting the Gospel of John together, with the guidance of the genial professor Edward Sri. We will be using the "Follow Me" program from Ascension Press, which I reviewed some months back. We could just as easily have chosen a different approach to the same Gospel, one prepared by Thomas Garry, a third-order Dominican from New Jersey who sent me a review copy of his book Through Lent with John's People.

Garry published his book through the Dominican Nuns of the Perpetual Rosary (Summit, NJ), and informed me that "all proceeds from its sale will go to fund the expansion of their monastery." (My first thought on reading that was, "what proceeds?" We could have told them that book publishing is no way to make money!) Well, hopefully the promotion of the book will raise awareness of the sisters' need for new space for the vocations the Lord is sending them, because book sales are not going to cut it.

Garry has mapped out almost the whole Gospel of John, spreading the passages out across Lent and clear through to Easter Sunday. The Church itself privileges the Gospel of John during Lent, particularly in Year A, but always in the Sacred Triduum and continuing on through the Easter Season, so praying with John is praying with the Church.

Each day's passage is given in full, followed by a reflection (about three pages' worth) and concluding with questions for personal application. Those questions are probably the most valuable part of the book (outside of the Gospel text itself) and could be very helpful in making an examination of conscience before confession. In fact, the person who  uses this book for Lent will probably be led to the Sacrament of Reconciliation on a rather regular basis, because the reflection and the questions themselves do not fail to challenge our all too easy accommodations with the spirit of comfort.

Through Lent with John's People is a worthwhile book for your Lenten prayer.


Disclosure of Material Connection: Some of the links in the post above are “affiliate links.” This means if you click on the link and purchase the item, I will receive a tiny affiliate commission. In addition, I received a review copy of the book mentioned above for free in the hope that I would mention it on my blog. I am committed to giving as honest a review as possible as part of my community's mission of putting media at the service of the truth. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”