Some Practical Notes on Lent

The word "Lent" shows that Christianity began in the Northern Hemisphere. The word comes from the Anglo-Saxon term for "Spring", "Lenthen", which, in Britain and Europe coincides with the forty days of preparation for Easter. In Southern Europe, the season is described more literally, in Italian, for example as Quaresima, the forty days. This is derived from the original Greek word for the penitential season. But, transplanted to our Southern Hemisphere Lent still remains the springtime of the Church. It is a time of growth, in spite of the Autumn, a time of spiritual growth.

The origin of Lent is somewhat obscure. It seems to have developed into forty days of fasting and prayer through the process of preparing catechumens for baptism at Easter. Thus, by the Fourth and Fifth Centuries forty days was the norm, although these days were arranged somewhat differently in various places. Saint Augustine and Saint Leo the Great claimed that the apostles instituted the forty-day Lenten fast. While this is evidence for established practice in their time, the claim does not rest on good evidence.

Certainly some fasting before Easter was almost universal from the earliest times, but it took the form of a forty hour fast, or even only a day, similar to our modern provision for obligatory fasting and abstinence on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday. In fact the Friday fast before the weekly paschal celebration on Sundays is more ancient than Lent. Saint Athanasius is the clearest witness to the beginning of what approximated to the season of Lent. But Ash Wednesday and the three following weekdays were added in later centuries to provide exactly forty weekdays of fasting in six weeks. Sundays have usually been exempted from the discipline, again in line with the ancient paschal tradition.

Ash Wednesday is based on the Old Testament sign of repentance and sorrow, mourning and self-abasement - throwing ashes or dirt over one's head, rubbing this on the face, and wearing old shabby clothes or "sackcloth". The blessed ashes marked on our foreheads are a simple sign, for Jesus did not favor people disfiguring themselves, preferring inner conversion and repentance (Matthew 6: 16-18). The ashes are made from burnt palms from the previous Palm Sunday. The words said as they are put on the forehead are" "Remember you are dust and to dust you will return" or "Turn again and believe in the Gospel." Two meanings are evident:

we are mortal and must die one day
but first we need to turn to God and repent.

Fasting

Much attention was paid in the early centuries to how one fasted. The strictest form of reducing food was the "dry fast", which excluded even animal products such as milk, cheese and butter and the better class of fruit and vegetables. This was mitigated gradually, interestingly enough and contrary to what we might expect, due to the rise of monastic life. The monks introduced a light evening meal to relieve the fast, the "collation", so called because Cassian's collationes were read at that time. The last memory of the stricter fast is Shrove Tuesday, when the fat and butter remaining in the larder is used up in making pancakes.

We should give up things in Lent. We should pray more in Lent, We should be generous to the poor in Lent. The fasting and abstinence should also be taken seriously, not only on the two obligatory days, but, a as free choice, also on Fridays. In these times we will not fall into extremism because the human body needs to be respected, another repercussion of the Incarnation. Let us never invoke the burden of work or study to serve as a "cop out" from Lent. A personal strategy is important, including some planned reading of spiritual authors.

Interesting as the particulars of the Lenten discipline may be, the very concept of Lent leads us to reflect on the wider question of times and seasons in our lives.

Why does the Church use times and seasons?

The Church Year is a celebration of time and eternity, of past events and present realities, both of the historical acts of God and celestial mysteries. Moreover, the cycle of the year points to eternal life. The Catechism of the Catholic Church 1163-1177 explains liturgical time, both in terms of our Jewish heritage and the celebration and reenactment of the Paschal Mystery. That is all very well, but what is the deeper theological rationale for the Church Year and the Christian calendar?

One good way to see time is in the perspective of the Incarnation, as another extension of the Incarnation, but in a particular way. "The Word became flesh" also means, in some sense, that the Word became time. We see this literally in the thirty-three year time span of Our Lord's life among us. But there is a broader perspective: Christians use time now because God uses and works through time.

God is working through the time space continuum in which, as Paul says, "we live and move and have our being". Lent comes around each year, inviting us to prepare with prayer and penance, with fasting and almsgiving, for the great celebration of Easter. Lent is the kairos of the Lord, his chosen time of present opportunities to grow, hence a spiritual springtime. In Australia, coming at the beginning of the next phase of your life here, it is a time when we should think about this new seminary year in terms of our priestly formation. Again we can reflect on the wider picture, on the whole process.

Lent is the time of the catechetical journey, because those involved in the RCIA prepare for the great life-changing sacraments through catechesis and prayer. They pass through various rites and steps leading to the celebration of the sacraments of initiation: Baptism, Confirmation, the Eucharist. The steps on their journey mark phases of choice, decision, growth, change, conversion, enlightenment, purification, repentance.

The Christian conversion of life to which we are called begins here, in these years of our earthly life. It has a specific focus, to prepare us to love God and serve others generously, to be for others selflessly. Therefore, as the catechumens move forward on their Lenten journey, we see in their pilgrimage a model for our journey. As they prepare for a sacrament of radical change so we can renew that baptismal experience in all its grace and power through the "second baptism" of reconciliation, through a personal confession and receiving absolution, through that moment of openness to healing Love.