In the ever-unfolding richness of the liturgical year, the Church offers a period of intentional preparation for the faithful to celebrate Christ’s Paschal Mystery: The life, death, and resurrection of Jesus the Christ. The season of Lent is a six-and-a-half week prescribed retreat for the whole Church. Within this season we engage in prayer experiences, often see an increase in confessions, and welcome the reprised significance of the three pillars of the season: fasting, almsgiving, and prayer. God’s Spirit, manifested and experienced in all creation, guides the activities throughout this season of intention and ushers the Church toward the celebrations of Holy Week and Easter.
An important function of the Lenten period is that it is “ordered to preparing for the celebration of Easter, since the Lenten liturgy prepares for celebration of the Paschal Mystery by both catechumens through the various stages of Christian initiation, and the faithful, who recall their own baptism and do penance” (Universal Norm 27).
We hear from the Book of Wisdom in the entrance antiphon of Ash Wednesday (Wisdom 11:24, 25, 27). This sacred Scripture opens the celebration and fosters the unity of those gathered and introduces their thoughts to the mystery of the liturgical time (GIRM 47). These verses brim with compassion from the Lord of Love and counsel hearers to remember that untidy spiritual entanglements, and the sins they have produced, don’t matter to our caring Creator: God loves us, God does not hate us. God implores us to return with humble hearts. It is the Spirit (the Ruah, the Pneuma) that breathes new life through penance, confession, and our spiritual convictions. Our humble response to the antiphon text: “Be merciful, O Lord, for we have sinned.”
As we receive the symbolic sign of ashes on Ash Wednesday, we participate in a ritual act that predates Jesus and unites us with our revered ancestors: Esther, Samuel, Isaiah, and Jeremiah. Each wore ashes as a sign of their penitence. Today we embrace this symbolic act and cling to its purpose until the beginning of Mass on Holy Thursday. It is an outward sign of an inner resolve to pray—for others and for self. We want to cleanse ourselves and this act of confession of our sinfulness mediates a Balm in Gilead [that heals] the sin-sick soul.
But the Word [who was] made flesh and dwelt among us is the one whom we seek to witness to the world.
“For when the fullness of time arrived (Galatians 4:4), the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us in His fullness of graces and truth (John 1:14). Christ established the kingdom of God on earth, manifested his Father and himself by deeds and words, and completed his work by his death, resurrection and glorious Ascension and by the sending of the Holy Spirit” (Dei Verbum 17).
During our Lenten sacrifices of praying, fasting, and almsgiving, we espouse an adherence to the words and deeds of Jesus the Christ. We identify with his humanness. The pain we know he suffered on our behalf gives added weight to our Lenten journey. Think again about what you will give up and the uncomfortable truth it causes when habitual cravings demands attention.
Think, if you will, of Catholic spirituality as the central core of an awareness of God. An awakened spirituality revives and refreshes our relationship with the Almighty. The sacraments of baptism and confirmation frame our continuous quest for a fruitful life in Christ. Life-giving water has bathed us; the oil of gladness poured over our heads; the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ nourishes our souls. The Church offers ritual avenues of grace that strengthen our bond with God. The Ruah, the Pneuma, the Holy Spirit, the very breath of God sustains this bond.
The Eucharist is the “source and summit of Christian life” (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1324) from which we gain wisdom (Pneuma), inspiration, nurture, encouragement, community, and belief. We receive bread and wine confected by the priest in the celebration into what we truly believe is the Body and Blood of Christ. We experience love and love others in return. We are disciplined by the Church’s teachings and transformed through our participation in the Paschal Mystery of Christ. God’s Spirit (Pneuma) and the Church’s ministry act in concert to encourage deeper spiritual meaning in our lives.
Prayer
Do you need to speak frankly, deeply, and pleadingly, but can’t bring yourself to speak to God in said manner during this penitential season? Pray with the psalms. They contain within their poetry the capacity to express: petition, praise, repentance, thanksgiving, supplication, anxiety, or even anger. They function as a reminder of what God has done in the past and surely (for the faithful) will do again. The Book of Psalms is a brimming resource that nurtures the soul.
Meditating with these two verses of the beautifully realized poetry of Bernadette Farrell, allow Psalm 139 to come to your aid when inclined to thoughts of abandonment and a weakened resolve. God is always there.
“O God, you search me and you know me. All my thoughts lie open to your gaze. When I walk or lie down you are before me: Ever the maker and keeper of my days. Before a word is on our tongue, Lord, You have known its meaning through and through. You are with me beyond my understanding: God of my present, my past and future, too” (BB/ MI 438).
Fasting
A message from the sixth chapter of Matthew’s Gospel: “Take care not to perform righteous deeds in order that people may see them…when you pray, go to your inner room, close the door, and pray to your Father in secret… When you fast, do not look gloomy like the hypocrite… anoint your head and wash your face.”
Discontinuing the use of cell phones on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday are yet other suggestions for keeping the Lenten fast. Will those actions help us to relate to Christ’s suffering? Remember: fasting is an ancient way of preparing for the Eucharist—the truest of foods. We turn our prayer and charity concerns away from ourselves and toward the other.
Almsgiving
The “surprise guest” on the April 25, 2017 TED talk was none other than Pope Francis. He makes a plea for almsgiving; one of an adjusted view of the corporal works of mercy. He said, “The future is made of yous, it is made of encounters, because life flows through our relations with others.” He “lends an ear” to the migrants, to prison inmates, and those searching for jobs. Lastly, he says, “[T]he future is, most of all, in the hands of those people who recognize the others as a ‘you’ and themselves as part of an ‘us’.” Pope Francis calls for “A revolution of tenderness… It is the love that comes close and becomes real.”
Since Christ accomplished his work of human redemption and the perfect glorification of God principally through the Paschal Mystery, in which by dying he has destroyed our death, and by rising restored our life, the sacred Paschal Triduum of the Passion and Resurrection of the Lord shines forth as the high point of the entire liturgical year (Universal Norm 18).
We are ready.
You can find more seasonal resources on our Lent and Easter page, here.
Originally published in Today’s Liturgy © 2017 OCP. All rights reserved.
Rawn Harbor
Rawn Harbor is one of the preeminent African American Catholic liturgists and musicians in the U.S. today. A gifted pianist and composer, he is also a much sought-after workshop facilitator, speaker and liturgist.