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Sunday, February 28, 2021

EXPRESSIONS by Father Ed

Keep Lent Simple

Lent may be a spiritual season but it also is a valuable opportunity to deal with real issues.  The usual practices of Lent cannot be expected to adequately cope with the varying circumstances of life each year, particularly in the unprecedented throes of an unrelenting pandemic.  To give up anything this Lent is only adding an extra and unnecessary burden to the isolation, worries, and grief that most people already are feeling.  The challenge for this Lent, then, is to decrease the threatening pressures of life.  Many of us have been doing this ever since the pandemic began by donating money to charitable funds, especially our own here at St. Timothy’s, delivering food to families, and helping neighbors, particularly the elderly.  Lent encourages us to continue doing this because so much need still exists.

Despite the lack of travel, the on and off lockdowns, and the social distancing, the pandemic ironically has brought the world closer together.  Everyone seems more aware of each other’s difficulties and struggles.  Life seems more like a community experience.  Lent can assure the same effect if all our practices are people oriented,  This means adopting an attitude more than an action program because a change of behavior is premised on a change of perception.  For Lent this year I recommend, then, that we resolve to honor the innate humanness of every single person.  This may involve the shedding of stereotypes, which prevent us from recognizing the inherent value of others.  These stereotypes can be political, racial, religious, sexual, tribal, or national.  The starting point of Lent is simply to credit every person with goodness.  We don’t have to agree with others to do that.  We may not understand them but without goodness we never will.  The only way to overcome the prejudice and divisions in present-day society is to presume a basic level of goodness in every single person.

While this concept is a central tenet of authentic religion, it is also corroborated by literature and the arts.  Thus, contemporary music, e.g., pop, jazz, and rap are heavily influenced by Black culture, and so is modern design.  Gays similarly are very influential in the world of fashion and dance.  In this context, how can prejudice against Blacks  and Gays still be so prevalent?  Comics and the movies developed from them, ironically, are more advanced than society.  In the Marvel series, for instance, the main characters, the odd, the handicapped, and the least likely are the real heroes.  In the Gospels, these are the very persons who represent Jesus.  Religion is ultimately people focused, which is the reason the Golden Rule “Do unto others what you want them to do unto you” is the fulfillment of the whole Bible.  The practices of Lent, therefore, ought to reflect this fundamental interpretation.