St. Paul's Lenten reflections

Once again we bring you reflections for each day of Lent written by members and friends of St. Paul's. The first, by poet priest Doug Vest, is posted for Ash Wednesday. Please have a look and come back each day. The link to the reflections is HERE, and you can also click on the colorful cross icon on this page to get there.

Lenten reflections from St. Paul's

Once again, the people of St. Paul's have written reflections for the season of Lent, beginning with a reflection by Jane Rotch. The reflections are in a booklet available at St. Paul's, or on-line. We will be posting the reflections each day on a special blog which you can find HERE. May you have a blessed Lent. You can also find it by clicking on the icon at the left side of this page.

Uh oh, it's Lent. Now what do I do?

Lent is upon once again, the season of fasting, penitence, and "giving up" things.

Maybe this year I should try to take something on -- like writing on this page again. I admit I've felt too pressed for time, found my life filled with too many meetings and too many mini-dramas in the church world to take the time to reflect in this space. But I've missed it.

So, dear readers (those of you who still come here), it's time for me to get back to pen and paper (or fingers and keyboard) and start writing again.

As Lent unfolds this year, I will likely have a few things to say about issues in our world, like guns, poverty and homelessness. I also will reflect once again on prayers, church politics (maybe), and post a few jokes for good measure. And cartoons by Dave Walker, like the one on this page.

Let me also mention that members of our wonderful Charlottesville congregation wrote reflections for Lent, one for each day. You can read them on a special blog we've set up HERE.

If you lose the link, it all you need do is click the purple cross on the upper left and that will get you there, or go to the homepage for St. Paul's to find the link.

May you have a blessed Lent. Ashes to ashes.

Jim+

The First Sunday of Lent: Prayerful paths and slowing down

Lo, we descend into the valley of Lent…

This is supposed to be a time of simplicity, introspection, fasting and penitence. But it gets complicated quickly at St. Paul’s.

This morning we will chant the Great Litany, as complex an opening to worship as ever there was. We will be commissioning our new pastoral care Stephen Ministers at 10 am, and Pastor Ann Willms will be preaching today.

Later in the day, I will be offering the first in a seven-week course leading to adult baptism, confirmation or reception into the Episcopal Church.

Meanwhile, Pastor Heather Warren will be offering an introduction to the work of author-speaker Brian McLaren who will be joining us next Saturday and Sunday.

Lent is supposed to be a time of slowing down, but it does not yet feel that way for me. So I feel somewhat hypocritical in urging you to slow down and have a Holy Lent (as my mother used to put it, “Do as I say, not as I do”). So please let me offer a few brief ideas about what Lent should really be about, and I offer this to you much as a reminder for myself:

Lent is a gift to the heart. Lent can be a time not of obligation but of careful and prayerful discernment about our life path, and how God is calling us to live our life of faith in the world. It is a time of confession, of looking honestly at where we have fallen short. It is also a time to feel reconnected in our deepest self to God our creator and celebrate the gifts God gives us. This can be a time a feeling affirmed on our path, or feeling called to new directions, or maybe a combination of both.

Traditionally the Church asks that we “give up” something for Lent as a way of focusing on what is truly important. Fasting can nudge us into being less self-indulgent and more aware of the needs around us and the places God is calling us to go. Fasting that is falsely pious is no fast at all.

My suggestion is to make your fast something important and hard. Maybe instead of giving up chocolate, give up fear. Or instead of giving up meat, give up gossip. Or instead of giving up ice cream, give up petty complaining.

Lent is a time for renewal of prayer. There are many ways to pray, but all require practice. Find a regular time in your day to pray that works for you and stick to it. Get up earlier if you need to, or turn off the television or computer earlier in the evening. Use the prayer book or pray spontaneously from your heart. Reading the Bible daily in small doses can enrich your prayers and your life. Rather than getting hung up on the factoids of the Bible, let you imagination find the Holy inspiration between the lines.

You can get instant help on this: We’ve provided a series of reflections for each day of Lent written by members of St. Paul’s, and each reflection is connected to the Scripture readings for the day. All of this can be found on a special blog by clicking HERE, and the blog has links to each day’s biblical passages.

Sometimes the biblical passages fall flat with me, and that is perfectly OK. But sometimes they touch my deepest core. Today’s Epistle from 1 Peter 3:18-22 is written in coded first century language, but decoded it is a declaration of hope, that no one is beyond grace and redemption, that Christ went to the grave to find people in the grave:

“He was put to death in the flesh, but made alive in the spirit, in which also he went and made a proclamation to the spirits in prison.”

Finally, let me leave you with a poem for Lent that I rather like, by Madeleine L’Engle (1918-2007), whose writing reflects her deep faith and her interest in science.

For Lent, 1966
By Madeleine L’Engle

It is my Lent to break my Lent,
To eat when I would fast,
To know when slender strength is spent,
Take shelter from the blast
When I would run with wind and rain,
To sleep when I would watch.
It is my Lent to smile at pain
But not ignore its touch.
It is my Lent to listen well
When I would be alone,
To talk when I would rather dwell
In silence, turn from none
Who call on me, to try to see
That what is truly meant
Is not my choice. If Christ’s I’d be
It’s thus I’ll keep my Lent.

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May your Lent be filled with holiness and hope.

Pancakes and ashes: Preparing for a Holy Lent

 Today in the last day before Lent, and we traditionally have one more celebration with pancakes on "Shrove Tuesday." The word is past tense of "shrive," which means to confess. The idea came that we "shrive" by eating up the remaining fat from the pantries and prepare for the 40 days of Lenten fasting and devotion.  Today is also sometimes called "Fat Tuesday."

Tonight our young adults at St. Paul's will serve pancakes, so come if you can. The pancakes will be drenched in real maple syrup.

Tomorrow our Ash Wednesday services will be at 7:30 am, 12:10 pm, 5:30 pm and 7:30 pm (with choir). The ashes are made with the palms from last year's Palm Sunday. I burned the palms and ground the ashes on Monday.

There is a great deal going on at St. Paul's this Lent. For now, let me commend to you a series of meditations written by members of St. Paul's for each day of Lent, beginning with a reflection tomorrow Anna Askounis. The mediations are a gift from the people of St. Paul's Memorial Church, and come in a booklet that is yours for the asking.

We've put the mediations on a blog; a new mediation will appear each day on this new blog. The name of the blog is Lenten Devotions 2012, and you can access this site at lenten2012.blogspot.com or  by clicking HERE. I hope you will bookmark this site and go back each day for a few minutes. You can also leave your own reflections in the comment section of each entry.

Thanks to all of our authors, and especially to Ann Ribble for coordinating and editing this huge effort.

Invited to a Holy Lent

Our Ash Wednesday services yesterday were smaller than the previous year, probably because it is Spring Break at the University of Virginia, and the academic calendar trumps all else in Charlottesville.

Yet, I found it all four services to be a cathartic experience, more so foe me in the past. Perhaps it was because I am more aware of the pain a number of people are feeling both in our congregation and elsewhere. Perhaps it is because of my own need to slow down, take stock, turn back to basics, and experience the Holy right in front of me.

I would like to mention once again the gift from members of St. Paul's in the writing of reflections for each day of Lent. You can read a new reflection for each day by clicking the purple cross on the left of this page, or by clicking HERE.

May you have a good and holy Lent.

James+

Burning palms, ashes of pain

Today begins Lent, and we begin again in the ashes. As we did last year, members of St. Paul's wrote reflections for each day of Lent, and the reflection for today was written by Doug Vest, who is retired priest from the Diocese of Los Angeles who now lives in Charlottesville.

We've posted all of the reflections on a special blog, and the daily reflection will appear at midnight each day. You can find the blog by clicking HERE. You can also get to it by clicking on the purple Lenten cross on the left.

The readings for Ash Wednesday are Joel 2:1-2,12-17, Isaiah 58:1-12, 2 Corinthians 5:20b-6:10, Matthew 6:1-6,16-21 and Psalm 103 or 103:8-14.

May you have a blessed Lent. My homily for today is below:

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Ash Wednesday 2011

The ashes are oily and grimy and they smell. 

The ashes came from palm fronds – the palms that we blessed and carried on Palm Sunday a year ago. We carried those palm fronds around this church and sang hymns and carried them into Holy Week. 

Then, many of you saved your palms, maybe in a dresser drawer, or on a mirror, or pinned to a bulletin board. 

The palms dried out, cracked, and turned pale. 

Then many of you brought your palms back here, and on Monday, they were burned.
When palm burns it makes a thick gray smoke that smells like a brush fire, no surprise because palms are a type of grass. 

Many years ago, when I was news reporter, I covered a few huge wild fires in Southern California of the sort that destroy entire neighborhoods, 300 homes at a time, and trap people, sometimes to their deaths. 

The fires spread because palm fronds catch fire and fly through the air like flaming arrows, carried by the intense Santa Ana winds.

In one such fire, in 1980, in San Bernardino, I was nearly trapped, unable to get anywhere, and my eyes froze shut from the smoke. I was rescued by a news photographer and taken to a hospital. Of course, not before he got a few more pictures. 

The smoke of burning palm smells like death to me, and it still brings a pit in my stomach.

The pain and tragedy of the world are in these ashes, and they are a reminder of how quickly life can burn away. 

As we descend into Lent on this Ash Wednesday, we are reminded again that life can be tenuous, that many people live on the edge of living, and that the pain of the world is not far from our doorstep – and for some of you, has crossed your doorstep. 

The ashes remind us again to put first things first. 

First things first are not power and prestige, or titles and prizes, or degrees and social status. 

First things first aren’t houses, cars, and toys. 

All of those things are fleeting, all of that disappears eventually in the ashes. 

First things first: the people we love, the people who love us, the relationships we hold dear.

First things first: our loving God who holds us, pick us up, and is with us even when we don’t see or notice – no matter what, no string attached. 

In a few minutes, we will have ashes smeared on our foreheads to remind us of our own death. We tell ourselves that “it is to dust that we shall return.”

What an odd thing to do. 

Why do we do this? To remind ourselves that we cannot get to the promise of new life without passing through the emptiness of the grave first, whether at the end of our mortal life on earth, or in all of the graves big and small we fall into in this life by our own doing, or through no fault of our own. 

We don’t get to Easter without being lifted from the ashes. 

Think of these ashes as a gift to the heart. 

If we can catch a glimpse of our mortality in the ashes today, maybe we will see more clearly those things that really matter. Maybe we will see that our own death does not separate us from each other. 

Maybe we will see first things first. 

Instead of only seeing only ashes today, maybe we will catch a glimpse of how we are ultimately bound together by the Christ who promises we will get out of whatever hole we are in. 

Traditionally Lent is a time of austerity, and we “give up” something for Lent. Often, we give up something trivial, like chocolate. 

But maybe we should give up something more important. Maybe we should give up that which gets in our way of seeing God and seeing each other. 

The crucial sentence in the words of Jesus is the last: “For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”

See Lent as a gift to the heart. Look at Lent as a break, a forty-day Sabbath – a time of slowing down and being extra intentional about taking care of yourself. 

See Lent as a time for rest, and prayer, and being with the ones you love. 

See Lent as a time to take care of yourself: the health of your body, mind and spirit.
And see Lent as a time for shedding away that which gets in your way of seeing and touching God. 

Lent should not be an ordeal, but a true gift to the heart. And we can do this one-day at a time, starting here, together, now. 

Take time every day this Lent to look inside yourself. See again truly who you are, and whose you are, and who loves you unconditionally. Repent, a word that means “turn around,” and see what’s right in front of you. 

And then look outside yourself: Look for the Christ in everyone you meet and in everything you do – and look for the Christ in even in the ashes.

Lost Generation?

I am taking a break from typing words for a few days. First, a gentle reminder: the mediations written by St. Paul's members for each day of Lent can be found be clicking HERE.

And this: My cousin Sarah in Los Angeles sent this to me. It is called a "palindrome" -- it can be read forward, then each sentence can be read in reverse, and the meaning reverses when read in reverse. Trust me. Just watch. This is definitely worth a few minutes of your time.

Our Lenten reflections are now in the blogosphere

Some very talented members of St. Paul's have written a series of mediations for each day of Lent, beginning with a poem by Anna Askounis for today. The mediations are a gift from the people of St. Paul's Memorial Church to you, and come in a booklet that is yours for the asking.

We've also put the mediations on a blog; a new mediation will appear each day on this new blog. The name of the blog is St. Paul's Lenten Mediations, and you can access this site by clicking HERE. I hope you will bookmark it and go back each day for a few minutes. You can also leave your own reflections in the comment section of each entry.

Thanks to all of our authors, and especially to Nancy Brockman for coordinating and editing this huge effort in honor of our Centennial celebration.