Lent
“Jesus,
full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led by the
Spirit in the wilderness, where for forty days he was tempted by the
devil. He ate nothing during those days, and at the end he was
hungry.”
Luke
4:1-2
This
piece of scripture is the basis for the liturgical season we will
enter this week—Lent. There is no such season in the Bible, nor
documented in the early church. It was instituted much later by the
Roman Catholic church as the season stretching six weeks from Ash
Wednesday until Easter, during which time Christians are to fast and
pray. Many churches reenact the stations of the cross and preach
sermons about the trial and crucifixion of Jesus. It is—or was—a
season of penance for the excesses of the previous year. As a child
in the Episcopal Church, I was given a small box on Ash Wednesday and
instructed to put into it the money I would normally spend on
whatever food I was giving up for Lent. I usually gave up the ice
cream bar I bought every day from the school canteen. Easter morning,
we carried our boxes and a bouquet of spring flowers to the front of
the church. The boxes went into the offering basket, and the flowers
were used to adorn a mesh covered wooden cross.
I
don't see people observing Lent these days. Our major observation of
the season is Mardi Gras, that annual ritual of excess and
debauchery. Mardi Gras used to be held only on Fat Tuesday, the day
before Ash Wednesday. In the church of my childhood, we always
celebrated by having a pancake supper with loads of bacon, and
sausage, and syrup galore. We weren't very wild, even in the
Episcopal church. Nowadays, Mardi Gras begins toward the end of
January and extends until Ash Wednesday—instead of the forty days
of fasting, we observe forty days of drunken street parades and who
knows what else! So much for penance.
This
year, I am going to try my best to give up sweets, specifically
chocolate, for Lent. I feel afraid at the very mention of it, which
tells me how much I rely on this pleasurable crutch to get through
the day. All I have to do to spur myself on is to think about all the
refugee children squatting in camps without much in the way of
sanitation, food, or clean water. Surely I can do without
chocolate for forty days and send the money to Save the Children.
How
about you? Will you give up something for Lent?
In
the Spirit,
Jane
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