"Follow me.” These are the first words the disciples of Jesus ever heard him address to them. They’re also the last two words of today’s gospel. But so much has happened since the first time those words were spoken to Peter and the others!

It’s Divine Mercy Sunday in a year dedicated to mercy. What better time to talk about Apocalypse?

There are four main plot lines in storytelling, rendered baldly with no curtseys to inclusive language. They are: Man against man. Man against society. Man against nature. Man against himself. All classic stories follow one of these principal arcs.

Throughout Holy Week we catch glimpses of the merciful Father in whom Jesus put the steeliest kind of trust. We see this mercy in the meal Jesus transforms from a simple supper to an everlasting promise of life.

God tells us to forget our sins and to remember divine mercy. We’re urged to let go of the misery of past failures yet cling to the solemn memory of the great things done for us by our loving God.

In the context of a secular world that rarely utters the name of God except in casual vulgarity, it’s easy to compartmentalize faith. In this context, church becomes the repository of things religious, and Sunday Mass becomes the sole interface between God and us.

Let’s just say it out loud: This is a weird grouping of readings we’re invited to consider! We’ve got a bush that’s burning and also not burning. We’ve got a rock that migrates all around the desert and is the Christ. And we’ve got a fig tree that doesn’t produce figs. What are we to make of this biblical collage?

We’ve all learned some useful things sitting in a classroom: How to read and write, add and subtract, name the 50 states (or some of them, at least), and random facts about the history of our country and the world. If we went to Catholic school, we also memorized prayers, lists of sacraments, and definitions of heavy mysteries like Trinity, Transubstantiation, and Virgin Birth.

Today is Valentine’s Day for lovers and World Marriage Day for couples. It’s also Presidents’ Day weekend—and the Rite of Election for those who seek to enter the church. But what all of us celebrate together today is the First Sunday of Lent. Not quite the beginning of Lent—we started the season on Ash Wednesday—but close enough for those may have missed their ashes but are ready to take the plunge into the season right now.

The past can be a poison pill, a capsule of regret: for what we did, for what we failed to do. We should have taken that job. We should have fought harder for that relationship. When we dwell on yesterday, we revive old injuries and refresh old anger. My parents never supported me. The system was against people like me.