The Spirit of God, which inspired every word He uttered and guided every act He performed, led our Divine Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ, to enter upon His forty days’ fast in the desert. And the spirit of Catholic faith and devotion, which is also the Spirit of God, directs us to imitate, as far as we may, the action and the example of our Lord and Master during the Holy Season now before us.
The imitation of Christ is the one essential aim of Christian life, and if we seek not to follow in the path He trod, our Christianity is a delusion and a lie.
We are called upon to give proof of the faith that is in us by a closer correspondence to the life of self-denial and mortification the Divine Redeemer led, and unless we give heed to this call our claim to be His disciples were but a mockery indeed.
We must take up the cross; and Holy Church now determines for us what its weight shall be. Fasting and abstinence, prayer and penance, are commanded, and we are bound to obey. And if we have the spirit of Catholic faith, our obedience shall be cheerfully given.
Do we not owe a debt of love to the Son of God, who sacrificed Himself for us? And how can we repay it unless we make sacrifices for His sake?
The spirit, then, with which we should enter upon our Lenten duties, is that of generous self-sacrifice for the love of God, not a craven spirit of fear at the thought of bodily discomfort and mortification.
The most austere life is sweet and easy when inspired by the love of God, and the most difficult acts of self-denial are cheerfully performed when prompted by the desire to imitate the sufferings of Christ.
The saints kept ceaseless fast and vigil, and were happy withal. The martyrs, in the midst of their terrible torments, enjoyed a peace that surpasseth all understanding, and if generous Christian motives actuate us, our fasts and our abstinences, while they chasten the body, shall soothe the soul, for as love casteth out fear, peace banishes the thought of pain.
Power of God 
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