“Remember that you are dust and that you are loved.”
I got a more colorful version of that from Father Carl+ this morning. (Thank you! it’s exactly the kind of blessing I was hoping for!) It was a wonderful way to start the Lenten season. But I can’t help but experience this year’s Lent in contrast to last year’s. I wonder if every spiritual milestone of the year will be experienced in contrast to last year.
Last year, I wrote of Lent “that these seasons are meant to be practiced in community… and that is the main thing I am lacking.” To start the season this year visiting fellow ministers in my neighborhood, inviting our neighbors into this season, was life-giving.
I entered the Lenten season of 2024 on auto-pilot. I was in a daze. In many ways I was functioning on “borrowed faith” as Tish Harrison Warren would call it. I can confidently say that it was the faith of friends and neighbors that sustained me that whole year when I lacked the faith to keep going.
For this year, I wanted to enter this season and I had a hard time settling on what to give up for Lent. I asked around and came up with nothing. In the end I decided to lean into something that saints have given up in the past: meat. So for the next 40 days I’ll be vegetarian… maybe pescatarian… I’ll cross the bridge when I get there. And I’m looking forward to breaking fast with a community of saints on Easter Sunday.
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