Lenten Literary Companions

The traditional Lenten practices of intensified prayer, fasting, and almsgiving are spiritual disciplines to be followed along the six-week pilgrimage from Ash Wednesday to the Easter Triduum. As I suggested in Roman Pilgrimage: The Station Churches, that journey can be lived as a kind of annual catechumenate-for-the-already-baptized, in which we join the catechumens—who will be baptized at the Easter Vigil or received into full communion with the Catholic Church—in a deep-dive examination of conscience and a more thorough reflection on baptism as the font of Christian vocation. Having literary companions along the Lenten journey can help us live those traditional practices more intensely. Spiritual reading comes in many forms, pre-eminent among them the Holy Scriptures.