“Are there not twelve hours in a day?
If one walks during the day, he does not stumble,
because he sees the light of this world.”
John 11:1-45
Gospel reading for the 5th Sunday of Lent
During this latter part of Lent, I am writing a weekly series of articles on forgiveness for the Diocese of St. Cloud and the “Everyday Discipleship” section in Central Minnesota Catholic magazine. In this week’s article, I talk about packing light for life’s journey and forgiveness as the means to do so. Today’s gospel also talks about “light” for the journey in a different sense: the luminescence of God’s creation — all of it in its natural God-given splendor. The two different meaning of our word “light” are related in that we need to unload and remove the grudges, animosities, and resentments that work like a blindfold against our seeing the light of this world. Again, forgiveness is the means to do that.
These articles will focus on Lenten themes of mercy, compassion, forgiveness, and accompaniment. Each article, in order, will also guide readers through a process to forgive another person as part of Lenten devotion. I hope you will read this second article in the series and consider trying out the guided experience of forgiveness yourself.
This third article is entitled “Road to Jerusalem, road to forgiveness” and can be accessed at Central Minnesota Catholic magazine.
You can still access the second article, “We, though many, are one!” at Central Minnesota Catholic magazine.
You can still access the first article, “A season like never before!” also at Central Minnesota Catholic magazine.
This article is an original work of the author and was not composed by or with artificial intelligence (AI). The author is solely responsible for the contents of this article and the opinions and perspectives expressed in the article are solely those of the author. © 2026 Thomas Delaney. All rights reserved.
top photo: Bayt Susin, Avi Nahmias, 2008
If your parish or faith community is seeking a deeper experience of wellness and forgiveness for inner renewal and spiritual growth, Live and Forgive is here to help. To begin the conversation, email Live and Forgive presenter and facilitator Tom Delaney at tom@liveandforgive.com — he will be glad to connect with you for a conversation.
Please type in your email and click “Subscribe” below to stay connected and get Live and Forgive articles delivered to you.
Take your learning deeper! Enter the term or word for any idea or thing you saw in this article that you want to know more about, and you will get a list of other articles that also talk about that idea or thing!
Live and Forgive 