Lent 2022

 

Lent is upon us.  Ash Wednesday is March 2.

Every year, Lent looks toward Easter, when we hope to celebrate what the prophet Micah promised “the sun of justice will arise with healing in its wings” (Mal 3:20). In RB 49, the chapter of the Rule dealing with Lent, St. Benedict describes that moment as one of “joy”.

This year, neither daybreak nor joy is much apparent as we continue to live under the dark clouds of pandemic and now war.  Of course, St. Benedict and his monks knew long-ago versions of both.  But then as now, Easter light—not a “thing” but the person of Christ, the “light of the world”—refused to succumb to the darkness of danger and fear (see John 12:12). As St. John assures us, that light has never yielded to the suffocating clouds of long nights like the ones we are living through (see ; John 1:3-5).

The stories which lie ahead of us in the Easter gospels suggest that when the risen Christ appeared to his disciples, whether the grieving Mary Magdalene in the garden near the tomb or the two disheartened disciples on the road to Emmaus, what he gave them was a new way to see and to hear in the wake of what seemed so disastrous a death.  As you likely remember, Mary Magdalene mistook him for a gardener (a very biblical mistake, as we will explore some other time) and was forced to see him differently.  The disciples, who are never named, were baffled by the conflicting news of his death and his startling appearance, alive, to various people.  As he walked with them, he set out again the meaning of the Scriptures till their hearts burned with new life—and fire gave light as well as warmth on their cold, dark journey (see John 20:11-18; Luke 24:13-32). .

In RB 49, St. Benedict offers us various traditional ways of refocusing our attention and centering it on the living Christ, in line with his admonitions to prefer nothing to that Christ, the epicenter of love.  Reading the Word with renewed fidelity will banish the darkness that leads us into a confusion of priorities caused by so many uncertainties about the future.  Compunction of heart—the traditional monastic description of a door opening onto the road to conversion—allows us to regret and walk away from all the forms of selfishness inspired by fear and loss such as those that still surround us.  Cutting down on some of the ways we comfort ourselves without reference to the love of God and neighbor frees us to see more clearly what really does matter when we look with Gospel-washed eyes. All of these simple tools ready us to see the reality of the presence of the risen Christ burning around us and within us, clouded but undimmed by the suffering that seems to prevail over all else at times like this.  Lent offers us an invitation and concrete ways to look again, see again, and strengthen one another in faith, hope and love, despite the terrible damage wrought by the despair caused by sickness, violence, power struggles, and utter disregard for any good but their perpetrators’.  By the light of Christ, we can look through and past all of these devastations to the real human love, generosity, service and self-forgetfulness that are also there but less dramatic to observe. 

At Easter, the candidates for baptism will be washed clean in the life-giving waters that flow, ultimately, from the pierced heart of the crucified Lord (John 19:34, with Ezekiel 47:1-12, Revelation 22:1-2)  , but even on the way, those waters wash over all of us, making blind eyes see, despair-constricted hearts expand, and lamed spirits too timid to walk the paths of God kick free and run the way of the gospel, as St. Benedict promises we will.  And, to put it at its simplest, the way of the gospel is always love, no matter how fierce the forces against it may seem.

One of St. Benedict’s key values is community, so let us join forces with one another to strengthen us on that gospel journey and to inspire us to invite others to come along toward the Easter sunrise on the horizon, beyond whatever obstacles attempt to block it! And let us raise our prayer together for all of those caught in the dark nights of disease and war, with all their consequences.

For Reflection:

These are not in the order to which the reflection cites them, nor are they the only references possible. As you read some or all of them, think and pray about how God might be calling you to translate them into the reality of your life during this Lenten season.

RB 49

John 1:3-5

John 12:12

John 19:34 (with Ezekiel 47:1-12, Revelation 22:1-2)

John 20:11-18

Luke 24:13-32

Matthew 22:34-40

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