As part of Jesuit’s pastoral ministry to Blue Jays, their families, alumni, and the entire Jesuit community, Fr. John Brown, S.J., will be producing a series of Lenten videos that will act as a guide for viewers and listeners during the season of Lent from Ash Wednesday through Easter. He recently launched the series with a reflection on the meaning and significance of Mardi Gras.

In this first video, Fr. Brown pointed out that the value of Mardi Gras is inherently bound to the sobriety of Ash Wednesday.

“We know that in the end that Jesus wins,” he said, noting that the Church’s calendar often focuses on the ultimate victory of Christ over sin.

“The book of Ecclesiastes tells us that ‘For everything there is a season, and a time for everything under Heaven: a time to be born, a time to die, a time to plant, and a time to reap,'” Fr. Brown continued. “And so we are in that cycle of feasting, and we have to respect that cycle. We don’t want to get stuck in a rut of moping around… and we don’t want to get stuck somewhere in that one place in the cycle where all we do is celebrate either. Because if all we do is either mope or celebrate, we end up losing the potency of the celebration or losing the potency of the sober feeling we might get when we fast.”

The entire video can be viewed above along with Fr. Brown’s video about Ash Wednesday, and members of the Jesuit High School community can find each video on Fr. Brown’s Youtube channel as they are released.