Lent is an ideal time for us to draw closer to God. When John the Baptist conducted his preaching in the desert he cried out, “Repent!” (Mt 3:1), and when Jesus began to preach in Galilee, He said exactly the same thing, “Repent!” (Mk 1:15). In fact, the very first words Jesus spoke are the same words used when ashes were imposed on your forehead at this season’s beginning: “Turn away from sin (i.e., repent) and believe in the gospel” (Mk 1:15).
While being sorry for sins, their honest confession, and deliberate amendment of a sinful life is the basic drama of everyday Christian life, the virtue of repentance lies at the intersection of sin and grace. However, it goes beyond feeling in order to express the distinct purpose of turning from sin to righteousness. The biblical word most often translated as repentance means a change of mental and spiritual attitude toward sin. According to the early Fathers of the Church, true repentance must begin with humility. Thus, to take your eyes off of the sins of others and, instead, to admit your own sinfulness is an act of humility. In acknowledging your faults you come to know more profoundly the love of God. Repentance, then, is to live within the dialogue of salvation.
The Greek word μετανοέω does mean to repent, but that word does not mean to turn around, even though repentance and turning your life around are often associated with one another. Whenever you repent, such an attitude constitutes a turning to God along with a turning away from sin. The Greek word μετανοέω does not enshrine any connotations of turning around because the implications of that Greek term are more mental—about what goes on in the mind of the person repenting. Etymologically speaking, μετανοέω is a compound expression composed of νοέω, which means to understand, to ponder, to think about, and μετα, which means with. Thus, the expression μετανοέω means “to understand with or to use the mind with.” When you repent, you are using your mind to realize that you have done wrong, to hate or regret your sins, and to change your mind for the better.
The Greek word μετα-νοέω resembles the English word con-science, since both terms imply corrective actions done with knowledge. This change of mind necessarily entails a profound interior conversion in which you firmly turn away from worldly darkness and embrace a new way of life as Christ’s disciples. Thus repentance is not merely to know of Christ, nor is it a matter of picking and choosing—doing so with an intellectual arrogance, selecting some aspects of the Lord’s teaching while coldly rejecting others; rather, repentance is a union of mind, heart and soul to the Person of Christ. To repent is to die with Christ, discarding your former way of life in favor of the Way, Truth, and Life that is Christ Himself.
The original Greek word metanoeo carried with it a very different meaning from its Latin translation that followed centuries later. Originally, the Greek term meant to take on a new and life-changing mindset. Now, quite often, the word repentance is shaded with guilt and penance. How did that happen? In the second century, the scriptures were translated from Greek to Latin. Paenitentiam agite or doing penance replaced the heart stirring sense of metanoeo. Modern words like penitentiary, penitent, and pain share roots in the Latin term paenitentiam. The Greek word’s Latin equivalent shifted thinking about repentance toward regret and payback instead of the awakening of hope contained in the Greek word metanoeo.
St. Francis de Sales speaks about the depth of conversion that repentance required by using the analogy of a sick man whose doctor has told him that he must refrain from sweets or he might die. While he followed the doctor’s order and refrained from eating sweets, St. Francis notes, “but most unwillingly, he talks about them, and measures how far he may transgress … and envies those who can indulge in what is forbidden to him” (Introduction to the Devout Life, Ch. 7).
Lent is a time to delve deeply into your life during this penitential season and to take a thorough look at what your values are and how you live them out each day — committing to doing good, better, and aiming at the best, while avoiding sin and categorizing sins you commit as bad, worse, or worst: Repent of the evil done and commit yourself to doing what is good.
Nature and dignity 