Lent is here, and it's really truly amazing - at this time every year, not hundreds of thousands, not millions, but millions upon millions of Christians (and, frankly, especially Catholics) begin to stretch themselves. They take on, in fact, I guess I can say we take on greater care for the poor, and fasting, forms of adult learning formation and growth, special devotions, giving up things, and adding on prayer. And they've been doing this, or we've been doing this for well, well over a thousand years. It's really amazing, and it's not just by mandate or by obedience or by order, but there is a longing in our hearts.

It reminds me of the story of the grandfather who took his grandson out to fly a kite this time of year, and it was a foggy, cloudy day. After about ten minutes, that kite was totally out of sight, and after fifteen minutes the grandfather wanted to go home. He said, "Let's forget the kite, let's go home," and the little boy said, "No, I want to keep flying the kite." So then he said to his grandson, "You know, there's a big kite-eating cloud up there, and it has eaten your kite and your kite is gone." And the little boy said, "No, no, my kite's still there." And the grandfather said, "How can you possibly know your kite is still there, you can't see it!" The little boy said, "I know it's there because I can feel it tugging at my hand." There is a longing in our hearts.

There is a tugging for all of us - something, Someone tugging at our heart and spirit, planting a hunger and a knowledge that we are called to do more, to be more, to let more of God in. It's called a season of conversion, and you can think of conversion in a couple of ways. One way, the Jewish community has a wonderful word for it, "baal teshuva." baal means "Master" or "Lord," and "teshuva" means "to return." That great word means, "to return to the Master or the Lord." In that sense, conversion is a return. It means, "to go back to - go back to the basics, go back to God." Jesus, in today's Gospel signals that everyone, Himself included, has the temptation to drift away, to put our trust somewhere else, to take shortcuts in life that seem to make it easier, but leave out God. So we all have need for conversion, to go back to, to return - baal teshuva.

But conversion can also be understood a different way - it can also mean moving into the future, to go somewhere we're never been before. The story of Adam and Eve tells us that human beings, you and I when we're born - from the beginning - fall short, far short of the promise of God's partnership, God's friendship, and God's joy that God has issued from the beginning of creation. We all have a long way to go, so here we are at the season that reminds us that we are always called to go back to God, and also to stretch ourselves into the future, into a fullness and a maturity that we have never reached before.

There are all kinds of tools to help us, but we have to make choices, decide what we want to do. There is daily Eucharist, there's the Labyrinth meditation walk. There are Small Faith Sharing Communities, there are opportunities for adult education. There is group Bible study, the possibility of personal, private reading of the Bible, or spiritual reading or reflection. Or fasting, or sharing with the poor, but each of us has to find and choose our own way to conversion, our own way to baal teshuva. I'm going to make one suggestion; I'm not going to embarrass you - I'd probably embarrass myself! - by asking for a show of hands, just think to yourself. How many remember who the homilist was, and what did he talk about last week? I'll give you a hint - it was me, and it was a salty homily! I talked about the eight flavors of Christian witness. And one thing you might try to do during Lent, take a few days at a time for each of the eight flavors, and say, "Where am I, and what can I do to stretch myself?" Remember, the first one was concern - concern beyond myself, beyond me and mine. The second is compassion - where am I with compassion in my life and for others? The third is justice - what can I do about justice, what do I think about justice? And the fourth was forgiveness. And beyond that, there was integrity, and then - my favorite! - humor, I hope there's a lot of humor this Lent in our parish community, and then creativity and finally, joy. However we go about it, this is a time and a season for conversion, because