21st February 2007Ash Wednesday
Fr Julian Browning
Joel 2 : 1 – 2 & 12 – 17 ; II Corinthians 5 : 20b - 6 : 10 ; Matthew 6 : 1 – 6 & 16 - 21
Rend your hearts and not your garments.
We're all in it together, trying to live as the Body of Christ, so that at our Easter communion together we are truly members of the resurrected Body of Christ.
The ashes remind us of our natural habitat, our mortality, a life
with a beginning and an end. It isn'tWe're all in it together, trying
to live as the Body of Christ, so that
at our Easter communion together we are truly members of the
resurrected Body of Christ. really an exercise in self-abasement, but
we sometimes think of it that way. Fortunately we don't have to wear
sackcloth as well, an unflattering garment of scratchy black goats
hair. In the Old Testament ashes were the accessory to a costume
indicating mourning, penitence, self-abasement. Humility, taking
oneself down a peg or two, is a useful exercise, but I think for many
of us this is an artificial exercise in Lent, because the old me is
still very much there, waiting for Lent to end. We always start with a
sort of list, because that's how we organize our lives, a list of
gloomy things I might do in Lent. I think we are often disappointed by
our own lack of progress. The private initiatives all too easily lack
conviction. The unfinished Lent book, concentration at services as bad
as ever, a brave stab at alcohol control. I am sure you are better than
all this than I am. Whatever we do or don't do, we are not ready for
Palm Sunday when it comes, and in no frame of mind to follow Our Lord
to the place of crucifixion.
So let's look at Lent in a different way. In the early Church the forty
days before Easter were a time of preparation for baptism, and the
catechumens, those being instructed, went through a very rigorous
programme of fasting and devotional exercises and teaching, leading to
a glorious baptism at Easter. Remember, they were all under pressure,
with a hostile world outside, so standards had to be high. The sponsors
of those going to be baptised had to show themselves as devout and
dedicated too. There was a worry that with more and more converts
flooding in, the standards would decline. So the preparation for Easter
became an obligation for everybody. You suffered and prayed and fasted
in solidarity with those going to be baptised. The self discipline
wasn't just about learning the faith, it covered every aspect of social
life. Christian society in the world was renewed each year. Be not
conformed to this world, but be ye transformed by the renewing of your
mind. This meant for the early Church, and it means for us too, that
observing Lent is not just for the devout elite trying to hone their
spiritual skills, it is of universal obligation. We're all in it
together, trying to live as the Body of Christ, so that at our Easter
communion together we are truly members of the resurrected Body of
Christ. The ashes business was actually a later tradition which became
tacked on to the beginning of Lent. Now I am the least communal of
Christians (though some of you might claim that title for yourselves),
but even I can see some value in a Lent which is universal, which is
not just about me trying to live in the desert with Jesus, not about me
trying to give things up, not about me jumping hurdles to win a prize
at Easter. Actually the Gospel warns us against this individual
approach. Don't look dismal like the hypocrites. Wash your face. Be
normal. In Lent we are swept up into something much greater than our
efforts at self-improvement. God is preparing our hearts and minds to
receive his Easter message of joy and resurrection. What a relief. We
don't have to do it all ourselves.
Our part, the part we do have to play, is repentance. We don't like
repentance because we don't like to admit that we've done
something wrong, or gone the wrong way. But it's necessary, because
it's sometimes the only way to get ourselves out of a very bad jam. One
of the psalms for last Sunday was psalm 38, which is well worth reading
in Lent. The psalmist is going through a bad patch. He says: My
iniquities have gone over my head; they weigh like a burden too heavy
for me. It is possible to live an outwardly happy and respectable and
successful normal life, and yet to be drowning inside, unable to
breathe properly, because of this addiction, or that compulsion, or
this regret, or that sorrow. Friends don't always notice, because we're
clever at hiding things. But, as the psalmist puts it, the light of my
eyes has gone from me. Lent is a good time, because it is a set time,
for emergency rescue, for letting light in again. Never mind ascending
mountains with St.John of the Cross. If we can isolate a couple of
burdens, iniquities, imbalances, in our own lives, and sort them out by
Easter, we shall have had a good Lent. A really good Lent, because we
shall have joined in God's work of preparing the hearts and minds of
His people to welcome His Son into Jerusalem.