Lenten collect: BOCP

Almighty God,

You know that we have no power in ourselves to help ourselves:  Keep us both outwardly in our bodies and inwardly in our souls, that we may be defended from all adversities which may happen to the body, and from all evil thoughts which may assault and hurt the soul; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the  Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.

Amen.

Book of Common Prayer

The Hardest Thing To Do

Eager for Father Theodore's morning lesson, Conradus took his place in the circle with the others, and peace settled upon him. Conradus did not know that when Theodore had passed through the novitiate the novices had sat in rows facing their master at the front. He did not consider Theodore's reasoning in arranging the stools in a circle; even so, he was not insensible to the atmosphere of community in this room. Here was a place where people learned together, and everyone felt included.

The young monks and their novice master, all now gathered, sat without speakng in the circle - another innovation of Theodore's. Invariably late to almost everyting as a novice himself, his memories were of lessons begun and half missed: he used to miss the start because he was late, miss the next bit because he was overcome with bitter humiliation and self-rebuke, and miss most of the rest because he couldn't quite make sense of it, trying to imagine what the bits he had missed might have been.

So he initiated the practice of starting the time together in silence.

"In silence we enter the room, brothers. In silence we take a place in the circle - any place, not my place or your place, not the same place always, for place is nothing to be possessive about. We sit quietly then and take in where we are. Sit with your eyes open or shut, it matters not; but be aware. Know that being a monk is not about withdrawal but about community, and feel the community here. We listen to our brothers...see them...smell them...(that usually brought a laugh) and we stay open to what else we can notice. Restlessness? Weariness? Friendship? Peace? Every day is different in community, and we are made more sensitive to the differences because every day is the same."

It's Lent

This morning John, Claire and I stumbled out the door and arrived at church for the 6:30 Ash Wednesday service.  I love the prayers of repentance, the ashes on my forehead.  I loved having the eucharist on a Wednesday morning. 

Almighty God, you have created us out of the dust of the earth:  Grant that these ashes may be to us a sign of our mortality and penitence, that we may remember that it is only by your gracious gift that we are given everlasting life; through Jesus Christ our Savior.  Amen.

Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall remain.

My Lenten reading:



Simplifying The Soul, a lovely blend of practical ideas and meditations, found thanks to my dear friend Laura.
The Hardest Thing To Do, the next in the Hawk and the Dove series by Penelope Wilcock.  I was THRILLED to learn of this from Semicolon, but what I did not expect was that each chapter is a new day of Lent.  Perfectly timed.
The First Fruits of Prayer, by Frederica Mathewes-Green. From amazon.com: 

First Fruits of Prayer will bring readers of all denominational backgrounds into the prayer experience of first millennium Christianity through immersion in this fascinating text, a poetic hymn written in the eighth century. This extraordinarily beautiful work, still chanted by Eastern Christians every Lent, weaves together Old and New Testament scriptures with prayers of hope and repentance. It offers ancient ways of seeing Christ that will nevertheless feel new to most readers today.

Bright sadness

Lent is called the season of Bright Sadness, because it is a time of both celebration and mourning.

That about sums up life right now. 

We have had so many things to celebrate lately.  Band gigs, debate victories, a piano recital, another Eagle Scout very close to his wings, more speech and debate excitement this weekend, daffodils blooming, sun occasionally shining, friends visiting, and everyone home and around the table.  Many, many reasons to celebrate.

But woven between all the celebration is a season of struggling.  The kind of struggle that has me flying awake at one in the morning, heart racing and mind frantic.  It takes me a long time to settle back down to sleep,  and it has me praying and breathing, breathing and praying, holding tightly to the ancient prayers that do not depend on my eloquence or my ability to know what I need.  I am incapable of eloquence and knowing right now.

This morning I woke feeling not quite so done in, and I headed out to drop my son off for his college classes.  As an aside:  car problems have ALWAYS figured into the despairing times of our life.  They themselves don't cause despair; they are just the waves erroding the cliffs, the bleach ridding the world of color.  And so when the drive shaft of our son's rather wonky truck was found to be falling out on the road on Sunday morning?  No surprise.  It was more of a, "Of course the drive shaft is there.  That makes sense" moment.

But back to my morning drive.  The car had no gas, and gas costs $3.84 a gallon, and we were pretty far from the gas station, and we were running late.  My response to these facts showed that I was fraying at the edges.  It was not just a need for gas, or even a fear of running out of gas; my response had that decidedly falling off the cliffs of insanity feel to it, a revved up, you never! you always! ring to it.  It showed the infrastructure of my mind for the shaking, weak and weary place that it is.  Fortunately my passenger was merciful; he even pumped the gas, and I could breathe again. 

But I do not like feeling so frail, so vulnerable, so easily rattled.

A few months ago, I visited the local Russian Orthodox Church.  At one point, the congregation lined up and each person had their forehead anointed with oil.  When I got to the front of the line, Fr. James asked me, "Do you know why we anoint your head with oil?  Well, in the scriptures we are called to anoint the sick with oil...and we are all sick, aren't we, Diane?"

And I wept. 

To have someone acknowledge that he knows I am "sick", that it is not a surprise or a disappointment or an inconvenience to him, overwhelmed me. 

The next time I visited, he asked me again if I knew why...and I said, "Yes, but would you please tell me again?"  Like a toddler with their favorite story, I needed to hear that good news one more time.  Pretty please.

So for now, as we are struggling with things that don't come down to circumstances or other people, but sadly come down to our own selves and our lifetime of choices, it is a deep comfort to remember grace.  God's grace, to be given as well as received, not deserved and yet freely given, the grace that slows my heart rate, steadies my breathing, and wills me back to sleep until the morning light. 

I am sick.  Anoint me with oil.

A Bright Sadness: Visiting the Orthodox Church during Lent

The church is dark. Circles of light glow from the vigil candles on the walls and the prayer candles that are lit and placed tilting in humble sand. The dark wood shines, though; it is a deep enough darkness that bits of light become bright. The saints on the walls remind us that we are not alone; we are surrounded by a great cloud of witnesses.

Women in scarves gather to the left, old and young, inquirer and cradle-born standing side-by-side. Men in black vestments or rain jackets gather to the right, chanting with rich familiarity or reading with hesitancy. The black vestments have flickers of gold, both dark and luminous.

Majestic and humble are co-existing this night in a beautiful and mysterious way.

The specificity of the confession is deep and honest. No skimming over, no subtlety. But then we sing, over and over, “God is with us” as another continues reading. GOD IS WITH US!

As we leave, the rain is unleashed with fury once again. We jog to the car, passing blossoms big and small on the trees in the church courtyard. They are pink and yellow and white in the lights overhead; as we speed past, the fragrance is like incense to bless us on our way.

This Orthodox world is full of physical pictures of spiritual things: light shining, dark filling, fragrance of blessing wafting in the air. The service stays with me long after I return home to the smell of dinner and the sound of skirmishes and speech practice and guitar strumming.

God is with us.

* Fr. Alexander Schmeman referred to Lent as a "bright sadness."