LENTEN UP!

By Fr. Gary W. Thurman

Here we go again.  It’s time for low-key music and spoken prayers.  It’s time for “Bless the Lord Who forgiveth all our sins” instead of “Blessed be His Kingdom, now and forever.”  It’s time to give up something which maybe we didn’t care for anyway, and call it fasting.  For some, it’s time to crawl on broken glass or nail themselves to crosses.  Above all, it’s time for sobriety, solemnity, and somberness, if not somnambulism.  After all, isn’t that what the Lord and the Church fathers expect from us?  It’s Lent!

Well, maybe that’s not what the Lord and the Church fathers expect from us.  Not the last couple of things, anyway.  We hear that Lent is a time to humble ourselves, so we put ourselves down.  However, humility is not putting ourselves down, but confessing that our source, our purpose, our very life, is God, rather than ourselves.  The Gospel for Daily Office on Ash Wednesday says that when we humble ourselves, we are exalted, lifted up.  Thus, true humility should gladden our hearts, instead of making us to go around looking like a mortician all the time.

Conversely, Jesus said that when we exalt ourselves, when we place ourselves at the center of our universe and forget our place in God’s Kingdom, He will humble us.  In other words, the true humility that Lent encourages raises us up, and the “down” experience is for those seek upliftment on their own terms.  So, this time of “intensive care for the soul” should lighten our hearts, instead of weighing us down.  Lent is supposed to bring us up, instead of down, because it reminds us that the way up … is down.  The proud are actually the lowest of the low, and the path of self-exaltation leads to the depths of depravity, while humility is the high road.  And perhaps that’s what the Lord expects, and perhaps that’s what the fathers had in mind when they designated this time of the year for special devotion.

This came to my attention recently as I was preparing the Lent themes for us here in the Cathedral.  This is something I have been doing for going on nineteen years now.  Six times previously – in 1994, 1997, 2000, 2003, 2006, and 2009 - I had come up with the themes for Lent from Lectionary Year B, and it was time to do it again.  But this year I saw things in the appointed passages that I had never noticed before; perhaps I was too busy looking down to see them.

Especially notable were the Scriptures for the fourth Sunday in Lent.  Traditionally this day was called “Laetare Sunday”, because the penitential nature of Lent was relaxed somewhat, the thinking being that the people could not withstand six straight weeks of such intensive oppression.  (A correct observation, which should have shown us that the oppressive approach to Lent was off the mark!)  The Latin word Laetare, meaning, “Be joyful” (from Isaiah 66: 10, the Introit for that day), was corrupted by some into the English “Lighten up”.  And it was the appointed Scriptures for “Lighten Up Sunday” that were so striking to me.

The readings begin with a proclamation from 2 Chronicles 36.  This passage spends nine verses recounting the unfaithfulness of Israel and their resulting deportation to Babylon.  In previous years, this was always the portion that caught my attention.  It was so Lent-like!  But this time I noticed the last four words of the passage: “Let him go up!”  Wow, it even included an exclamation point!  How could I have missed that before?  From there we go to the Psalm, which usually highlights some portion of the first proclamation.  Sure enough, there in verse four of Psalm 122 it is written, “To which the tribes go up.”  I was beginning to see a pattern, one I had previously ignored!

The Epistle reading is from Ephesians 2: 4-10, and includes the verse, “Raised us up with Him.”  Wait a minute!  Wasn’t Lent a time to look down, think down, be down?  What’s with all this UP business?  Then comes the Gospel, the story of the feeding of the five thousand.  Here again, there’s nothing down about that!  Rather, it begins by saying that Jesus lifted up His eyes and saw a multitude.  Other Gospel accounts tell us he looked up to Heaven and lifted up the bread and fish.  Then they gathered up the leftover food.  How much more up do you want?  Lighten up Sunday, indeed!

But should this not be the attitude for the whole Season of Lent?  It’s not about looking down, but looking up.  Humility is looking up to our Source, up to our purpose, up to great expectations in God.  Looking down is mere false humility, which leads to abasement from God Himself.  Is that what we want Lent to produce in us?

So yes, let’s “lighten up” this Lent.  That doesn’t mean that joviality and jocularity should rule the day; seriousness is still required.  But it is a properly focused seriousness, which will lead to us looking up, rather than down.  Let’s lighten up.  Let’s Lenten up!