Loading...Noting the "Lenten journey has begun," Bishop Terry Allen White invites his readers to find new life in this season of prayer, fasting and self-denial.
Beloved,
The Lenten journey has begun. The invitation in the prayer book reminds us of the marks of this season: prayer, fasting and self-denial. As a young and most zealous first-year seminarian, I approached the beginning of Lent with great seriousness, carefully designing a rigorous observance. It was the seminary's tradition to keep Ash Wednesday as a quiet day. Our leader was a venerable bishop, widely sought after as a retreat leader and spiritual director. I eagerly donned my cassock - the sure and certain sign of proper piety - and took my place in the chapel for Morning Prayer and the first address on prayer.
I don't recall much of that first address, but most of the second address becomes fresh for me every year. That address on fasting was a remarkable experience, in part, because it was not at all what I had anticipated. At one point it was as if the leader was speaking directly to me alone, looking at me with eyes filled with fire that did not consume, but purified me with divine love. He shook my prideful pre-conceptions until they crumbled. The leader asked: Is Lent 40 days of Ash Wednesday, repeatedly acknowledging our wretchedness while fasting from the grace and forgiveness God has given us? At the end of Lent, do we feel like exhausted survivors, or are we renewed and refreshed? Does the fast of Lent lead us, and the Church, to new life which we live forever? If not, then we best give up Lent for Lent.
And then he read from the Book of Isaiah:
Is not this the fast that I choose:
to loose the bonds of injustice,
to undo the thongs of the yoke,
to let the oppressed go free,
and to break every yoke?
Is it not to share your bread with the hungry,
and bring the homeless poor into your house;
when you see the naked, to cover them,
and not to hide yourself from your own kin?
Then your light shall break forth like the dawn,
and your healing shall spring up quickly;
your vindicator shall go before you,
the glory of the LORD shall be your rear guard.
Then you shall call, and the LORD will answer;
you shall cry for help, and he will say, Here I am.
Isaiah's fast will change me, will change us, and the Church. God grant us the courage and trust to keep such a fast.
With my love in Christ,
+Terry
