February 22, 2026

First Sunday of Lent Cycle A

Genesis 2:7-9, 3:1-7; Romans 5:12-19; Matthew 4:1-11

We hear a lot about Artificial Intelligence, or AI, in the news lately. It seems to be everywhere. AI is rapidly being employed in all aspects of life: the workplace, the schools, medicine, art – everywhere. And as history has shown, whenever there is rapid change in some aspect of our lives, the question that is inevitably asked is: is it good or bad? And, as it always is, this is an pointless question. It is asked by people who are either being sensational – and many in the media are extremely sensational, trying to be heard above all the other sensational pontificators – or they are woefully ignorant of the history of the world. The same question was asked by sensationalist and people who did not understand history about atomic power, about the railroad, about the car. Is a car good or bad? Can atomic power good or bad? Are the drugs known as opiates good or bad? All of these questions are hopelessly beside the point. They are just things, and things are neither good nor bad. It is merely in the application, the human application, of these things that they become good or bad. It is in the intent of the user and on the affect on the recipient that we can start to explore the question which gets as the goodness of badness of a thing. AI will no doubt be used for great good, improving the lives of many and helping to solve some great perplexing problems in the world of science, medicine, education, and elsewhere. But it will also be used for very evil purposes, and already has. But at the end of the day, the important question is: how will these things be used by people, for good or for evil.

Today's readings get at this same concept. Adam, Eve, and Jesus are all presented food: fruit from a tree for one, and bread for the other. Is this food good or bad? Of course we just gave the answer to that question: they are things, and are neither good nor bad of themselves. It is how they are used, the intent of the user and the effect that it brings that make them good or bad. In the First Reading, Adam and Eve are in the garden, and it is clear in the story that they have more than enough to eat and drink. They can't be hungry, and don't need any additional food. So why do they think they need this one fruit that God has told them they shouldn't ever eat. This gets at the idea of intention: why are they eating it? For a good reason, or for a bad one? As Genesis makes clear, they are doing so because they think that they will somehow become more powerful, like God himself, which as creatures that God made, they should know that they cannot be. Yet they do it anyway.

Fast forward to the Gospel, where we find Jesus in the desert. Satan tempts Jesus three times, and each time with something that, again, is neither good nor bad in and of itself. The first temptation: bread. The staple food of the area, something everyone ate daily. The second temptation: trust in God. Once again, something which on the surface appears to be a good thing. Finally, the third temptation: power over things of this world. Many people in our lives, whether at school, at work, in government, wherever, use power that they have been rightfully given to do tremendous good. So, like in the garden, the sin is not in the thing. It's never about the thing. It's the intention of the user and the effect that it has on others. Both must be for good.

Satan, whether in the first reading, the Gospel, or in our individual lives prompts us to do things for bad intentions. Even good initial intentions can be corrupted over time as one loses sight of the reason that they are engaging in a particular activity. Before anyone receives the sacrament of reconciliation, one should always do an examination of conscience, which is, in its essence, a look back at the intentions that we brought to the decisions in our lives. Jesus did this before he made his decisions in the desert, and did not sin. Adam and Eve did not, and therefore committed sin. So today's readings ask us: what have been our intentions in the past, and what will be our intentions in the future. And Lent is the perfect opportunity to look at this idea of intention.

But we must be careful in this examination. It can easily devolve into a checklist of dos and don'ts. And if this is what we take away today from the readings, that Jesus took from the do list and Adam and Eve took from the don't list, we have missed the point of the readings. In fact, we would have missed the point of the Son of God coming to earth and living among us, of his dying on the cross, of this whole Lenten journey. The important point is our relationship to God and one another. The point of being a Christian is first and last a relationship with God. As I explained to my OCIA class, the gift of the Holy Spirit which we refer to as “fear of the Lord” is not a fear based on some threat of punishment or wrath. There are consequences of our actions, not doing enough of the dos and too many of the don'ts, but this is not what Jesus came to tell us. The “fear of the Lord” that Jesus taught, that he demonstrates on the cross, is a fear that we will not live up to the expectations of the God whom we are told to call Abba, Father, the God who loves us and wants us to love him and his whole creation. In any healthy family, the parents can, and sometimes do, punish bad behavior, but not out of any intention other than love. That is where Jesus is in the desert, and that is where we want to be. In the end, it's not about the things, it's about our intentions, or, better said, our relationship to those things. So we ask ourselves: what are our goals in life, and how do they conform to the love of God? I'm not sure we every fully answer that question satisfactorily on earth, but, if we have a successful Lenten journey, we will get closer to the ideal that Jesus teaches us.

As we continue with our mass with the Liturgy of the Eucharist, let this communion we share bring us closer to God and one another, strengthening the relationship that we know we should have. May our relationship to things of the world be as tools for good and righteousness and not for evil. Jesus didn't speak about AI or any of the other modern devices we have, but today he shows us by example to use all things of this world for good, that is to say, with only love of God and others in mind.