"Repent and believe in the Gospel." 
Why does the Church call us to prayer, fasting, and almsgiving during Lent? During Lent, Christ's faithful people--the entire Church--goes on retreat. We seek to deepen our communion with God. These three religious practices of prayer, fasting, and almsgiving are the means by which we can do this. Jesus taught us this. Prayer is communion, communion with our source and our end, the Alpha and the Omega, the one in whom we have our being and the one who fulfills our deepest longings. Prayer is our relationship with God. Fasting is an act of faith that declares I am more than my flesh, I am more than this world offers. Thus, we discover the source of true life, in the Spirit. Almsgiving is also an act of faith by which we lift up our poor brothers and sisters. It acknowledges, like fasting, that my life is not what the world offers, I use what I need, to aid my brothers and sisters. So these three--prayer, fasting, and almsgiving--are acts of the virtue of religion by which we seek to deepen our communion by shedding what keeps us apart from God and each other, and surrendering to him. 

It is a great adventure. Who knows what the Lord will reveal to us this Lenten Season!