Where Were You? (03/27/2026)

“Where were you?” I remember asking that question that night when I got home after midnight. I’d had a blow out of a tire on the interstate on the way home from speaking at a parish. When I’d tried to call home, there was no answer. I got help from my daughter, her husband, and AAA, but I still was so worried about why my husband hadn’t answered the phone. Come to find out, he was asleep and never heard it.

The situation makes me think of times as a teen that I was late. That was always the first question that my parents asked. The question was based on understandable concern and worry. The situation also makes me think of the times I was the parent waiting for a teen and painfully understood better my own parents’ earlier reaction.

The situation also makes me think of the LORD asking us rhetorically (the LORD knows exactly where we’ve been and what has kept us away). The LORD isn’t worried by uncertainty as we are when one we love is not where we hope they would be. Rather than anxiety, I know from the writings of the prophets, that the LORD grieves our absence and the effect of our choices on our relationship. The LORD created us for loving unity with the Blessed Trinity.

Always in our lives, the LORD has desired our loving presence and grieves separation. If anyone doubts that, all one has to do is read the Pentateuch and the Prophets and one will see how the LORD pines for His beloved children. And one can follow that up by reading the Gospels and seeing the measures the LORD takes to bridge the separation and achieve reconciliation.

Lent is a time for us to look at our relationships not only with one another but with our all-present and ever-loving LORD. Are we as present to the LORD as we should be? Are we where we should be in our relationship? If not, could we give a satisfactory response to the questions, “Where have you been? What has kept you away?”

May we use these final days to truly look deeply and honestly at our relationship with our LORD, Creator, Savior, Sanctifier. As we continue our Lenten journey, let us commit to identifying what has kept us away and resolve, through the guidance and grace of the Holy Spirit, to return, with all our heart. Let us acknowledge contritely any indifference to our need for conversion of heart, mind and spirit that has prevented us from drawing nearer to our LORD.

Until tomorrow, love well.