Lent Half Way Point: Laetare Sunday

Laetare Jerusalem: et conventum facite omnes qui diligitis eam

We Catholics often get a bum rap about having a rigid religion, from inside and outside the membership.  If you want to project a stern religious environment, there are few stock characters as reliable as the strict nun.  Also, thanks to the United States Council of Catholic Bishops, American Catholicism is often out of step with the rest of the world, including Pope Francis.  Catholicism is often associated with a cultural conservatism and rigidity that undermine some of the more interesting and human aspects of the Church.

Take Laetare Sunday, a most Roman Catholic notion.  Basically it is the half way point through lent and it is meant to be a time of celebration, or to use the Latin translation: Rejoice!  While Sundays during Lent are not part of the 40 days of observance, the intention of Laetare is to pretty much take it to that next level.  Think about that for a second.  In the middle of this period of fasting, penance, reflection and alms giving, we have set aside a day to not just ease up on our practices, which Sundays are for, but to, in fact, rejoice.  I don’t know about you, but rejoice has a pretty powerful connotation.  It’s more than just an extra donut on Sunday.  I don’t know if it goes all the way to a Carnival kind of level, but pretty close.  If I were to put a song to it, or a moment it would be something akin to that release of joy when the game winning hit is struck, or more long lasting when Phish have built up an amazing jam, and then releasing it at that right moment and the entire crowd cheers.  It is that euphoria of the moment, but then that joyous time after, that afterglow.

I’ll admit, mostly because of my wife giving me grief about it, I pretty much keep up with my Lenten practices on Sundays, the consequences of being a pastor’s kid I suppose.  What’s funny is that I haven’t really missed my social media outlets even on Sundays.  There have been a few times that I’ve had a quip or seen something I wanted to share, but the daily (in twitter’s case, constant) checking of sites has not been a missed chore.  As a matter of fact, this past Laetare Sunday, when I was rejoicing in an absolutely fabulous way by playing golf, I actually missed mass.  Not just missed it because I was golfing, but missed it as an experience.  With the kids in CCD, I tend to get to mass much more frequently and since the turn of the year, we’ve been going pretty regularly.  It’s gotten back to routine and during Lent I’ve been particularly enjoying it.  I don’t regret golfing, not by a long shot, but I wish I could have added to a joyful day by attending the celebration in church.  Something to remember come next year.

 

A Week in and I’m Just Fine

A week into Lent 2015 and I’m feeling pretty good.  I won’t say that I don’t miss my social media outlets, but it hasn’t been as hard as I thought it would be.  As far as what has been the hardest platform to do without, I’d have to go with Twitter.  I really missed it during the Academy Awards.  Good, snarky comments are always fun during award shows.  When baseball is officially back, I will still have a week or two to go until Easter so that is going to be rough.

I don’t miss Facebook as much as I thought I would.  Though I do miss keeping tabs on some of my favorite folks, it really hasn’t felt like a void.  I can definitely see just turning it off during election season.  I do have a fun project in mind for Facebook after Easter.  I would like to see if there is a way to collect a series of updates and make them one blog or something or other.  But first I need to make the status updates.

The true killer has been the treats at work.  I’m happy to report that I haven’t broken as of yet, but it is hard.  Two days donuts were in the office and another day a student brought in homemade brownies.  I mean, COME ON! Am I made of stone!?! Thinking about that for a second, three out of five work days thus far during Lent there have been treats around.  No wonder I can’t lose any weight.  It is amazing too, how temptation has a way of finding us.

I have really been enjoying, however, the Lenten observance my employer has provided this year.  If you are looking for a quick, easy and very good way to get back to prayer and reflection, I encourage you to visit Igniting Our Values.  It shares each days gospel, reflections from Jesuits and lay people and also offers some multimedia bits as well to help and inspire reflection.  I’ve particularly enjoyed the music provided on the Spotify playlist, beajesuit.  Give it a lesson if you’re into that sort of thing.

A week in, and I’m feeling it.  I think at this point last year, everything had already gone to shit.  There is something about making a good start that helps me keep moving.  A spiritual and metaphysical kind of Newton’s Law.  Here’s to staying in spiritual motion.  Have a good week everyone.

Get Your Lent On!

It’s the most wonderful time of the year! Well, that might be the wrong way to phrase it, but I always get recharged by the season of Lent.  Since I experienced a rebirth of faith many years ago Lent and Easter have been particularly special to me.  The time is about self-reflection and re-dedication to many of the tenets of the Catholic faith that I hold dear.  Since I’ve been practicing these exercises, I haven’t seen it as a burden or struggle, but often times as a way to focus on self-improvement as well as an expansion of my spiritual life.  One thing that has drawn me to the season is that the word Lent is pretty much a Germanic word for spring, a season itself ripe with symbolism and power both religious and secular.  I don’t know why Lent caught on as the name for the preparation for Easter, but I’m glad.  Using a word like Pentecost (the fifty days following Easter), tessarakoste or the forty days, might be kind of cool too, but I like the connection to the natural world.  Spring is the end of winter, which seems to get harder each year.  It is the return of baseball and the promise of summer.  And while the chocolatiers and Hallmark try their best to commercialize the holiday, its religious significance far out strips the secular celebrations unlike Christmas.

Ending at Easter is quite powerful.  Easter is the day when Christians really get down to it.  I find it very meaningful that according to the Catholic tradition, Lent ends on Holy Thursday, or the remembrance of the Last Supper.  It was on this day, this evening to be more precise, that Jesus makes the decision to give it all up to God.  This is where he accepts God’s will.  After that while it is significant, is really just a matter of following along.  Jesus is moved throughout the rest of the passion, with little resistance on his part, a willing sacrifice.  The true bravery, and inspiration for me, is that moment when he makes that fateful decision.  At that point, the debate is over, the course set.  What a perfect time to end our reflection, our searching and begin to celebrate the passion and resurrection.  In short to take the action that we have been preparing for over the course of Lent.

So how am I preparing this year? Glad you asked.  I have tried for many years now to incorporate the various disciplines called for by the Church during Lent.  It is much less about giving something up than including something, though I do still give up something.  Self-sacrifice is one of the tenets of Lenten practice.  I try and find something that will be a sacrifice, something that I enjoy but perhaps devote a little too much to it.  Many times I find that after Lent my sacrifice has shown me I really didn’t need my indulgence at all, like when I gave up watching sports media programs, Pardon the Interruption and the like.  Or it has brought me closer to someone, like when I give up sugar.  My wife doesn’t eat sugar as a matter of course and to really focus on that made me appreciate how difficult that truly is.  This year I’ll be giving up snacking after dinner.  I got to say, this is going to be quite difficult.  I loves me some chips and candy while watching TV at night.  In preparation for this I’ve already thrown out a huge bucket of cheese balls, lest temptation get the best of me.  I considered for a moment doing what my friend Julia is doing, giving up all processed food, but, well, a man’s got to know his limitations.

As far as adding things, doing good works, alms giving and spiritual reflection, these have been absorbed by the family this year.  The kids want to read the Bible for five minutes every day before bed time which I think is really cool.  Of course I get loads of questions just reading Harry Potter with them, so this should be an interesting forty days.  I also plan on meeting with my spiritual adviser at least once during the season, just take a moment and feel a connection to a greater mission.  Also the kids want to save money and give it to the local food pantry when Lent is over.  Again really cool and I’m very proud of them.  I didn’t prompt either one of these things I swear.  Maybe we can even do some volunteer work before Lent is over, that would be great.

I don’t know if this quite fits the “good works” ethos, but I hope to keep writing, hopefully 15 minutes a day before the computer is turned on, but after the prayers and meditation has occurred.  Adding more discipline always feels good.  So, it might be in poor taste to say “Happy Lent” but I hope you take a moment this spring and discover some way to renew yourself.  By April it will feel really good.