Ash Wednesday Meditation

Ash Wednesday        February 18, 2015 Noon

Joel 2:1-2,12-17         Ps.103       

1 Cor. 5:20b-6:10    Matt. 6:1-6, 16-21

 Lectionary Link

  Sometimes events happen in life for which we are not prepared.  There are big things, like wars and disasters and an entire array of losses which can happen to us for which we aren’t prepared.  Some losses are so profound, they cannot be prepared for and they catch us off guard even though we know that in an actuarial sense, we are not exempt from some of the harshest and worst things in life.

  The sack cloth and ashes mourning rituals of the Old Testament times came when people were faced with loss and devastating circumstances.  Such practices were rituals of humbling oneself before God as a way of saying “If my behaviors have been in any way responsible for this loss and disaster, I am now expressing my deepest sorrow, regret and penitence by this public and visible act of having been completely humiliated and humbled by these drastic losses."

  Wearing sack cloth and ashes, fasting and giving to the poor logically became public rituals in ordinary times so as to try to inoculate oneself and community from the disasters and losses which might occur at any time.  Sack cloth, ashes and fasting would be a time of communal preparation for the times when things could go wrong.

  We might ask ourselves as to whether we would have faith when things really go wrong.  Are we prepared to have faithful responses adequate to all human situations and circumstances?

  Athletic teams have practices and pre-season training and off season training for what purpose?  They want to try to simulate practice and training to make it as difficult and as challenging as the games themselves, so that they can be prepared for the actual game conditions.

  And so the church has a season of Lent as a time to simulate conditions of need so that we can build our faith muscles to be prepared for all conditions of life.  We know that we are not exempt from a wide range of conditions of need and loss in our lives.   We know that hard time can throw off our faith and so we can become dysfunctional in times of loss and distress.

  We use the season of Lent as a time of voluntary deprivation as a way to prepare ourselves to maintain our faithful practices when we are forced into situation of involuntary deprivation.

  Is it important to pray in our closets in secret and in privacy?  Indeed it is.   Is it important to pray in public?  Yes, we can pray in public with the same motive for which we pray in private. The clergy who lead the public prayers are the ones most tempted to pray in public in order to be seen by others.  We have to be seen by others when we gather to pray.

  I think the point of the Gospel is about personal authenticity in our prayer life and in our lives of faith.  Public religious rituals of prayer, giving alms or fasting will not benefit us if we do not match the openly public acts with an interior prayer life.  Prayer is when we wrestle in our interior lives to be honest and authentic with God and if we are doing our prayer work in our closets then our public rituals of prayer, alms and fasting will have authenticity and validity.

  The word hypocrite comes from the Greek word for actor.  And so when we do church are we just acting for an audience?  Or are we just being the extension of the prayer life which we have developed within our closet and private time with God?

  The season of Lent is about learning to be authentic in our faith.  It is spring training for being prepared to have genuine habits of faith guide us in the times of deprivation which might come to us at anytime.

  I wish us all a holy Lent; a time of simulated deprivations so that we might be prepared to be authentic and faithful in all of the conditions of life and so we can confess with St. Paul, “I know what it is to have little, and I know what it is to have plenty. In any and all circumstances I have learned the secret of being well-fed and of going hungry, of having plenty and of being in need. I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.”

  This is the goal of our Lenten season: “I know what it is to have little, and I know what it is to have plenty. In any and all circumstances I have learned the secret of being well-fed and of going hungry, of having plenty and of being in need. I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.”  May God use this season of Lent to prepare us to be able to make this confession.  Amen.