The Sin Driving American Life
“Go first.” The two-word Gospel command that dismantles everything that drives our American way of life.
Dear friends —
Letters from Leo is publishing daily Lenten reflections through Easter, available exclusively to paid subscribers.
Each meditation will explore what it means to follow Jesus more faithfully in the midst of American civic and political life — not as partisans first, but as Christians whose consciences are shaped by the Cross.
Lent is a season of repentance, renewal, and resolve.
It is a time to confront our idols, strip away our illusions, and allow the light of God’s redeeming love to search and purify our hearts.
I hope you will walk this forty-day road with me — as your brother and fellow sinner — embracing prayer, sacrifice, and deeper conversion, and allowing the God of liberation to claim every corner of our lives and our public witness in an age of creeping authoritarianism.
“If you bring your gift to the altar, and there recall that your brother has anything against you, leave your gift there at the altar, go first and be reconciled with your brother.” — (Matthew 5:23-24)
These words from today’s Gospel are among the most challenging in the entire New Testament.
Jesus is telling us that our relationship with God is inseparable from our relationship with our neighbor.
We cannot offer “holy” things to God while we are harboring malice or refusing to reconcile with those we have hurt.
One might call it the “sin of the unexamined grudge.”
In our polarized American life, we have institutionalized our grudges.
