In the Old Liturgy, the traditional Roman Rite, we are always slowly and gradually prepared for everything, prepared even for the preparation of something. Therein the liturgy seems to account for our design as human beings: we are not machines that can quickly – just press the button! – shift gears, but we need things to slowly seep into our minds, and hearts, and bodies, step by step. Not only does a child need nine months to develop in a mother‘s womb, but also does the mother need nine months to be ready to welcome the fruit of her womb into her arms.
The season of Lent is our preparation for the celebration of the Paschal mysteries of Christ‘s Passion, Death, and Resurrection, the high point of salvation history and the high point of every liturgical year which mirrors and re-presents salvation history to us, the story of the God who saves walking with His people, so that we may continually “live, and move, and have our being“ in Him (Acts 17: 28). 40 days of fasting, of praying, and of almsgiving, of repentance and of works of mercy, shall prepare our hearts for the reception of the graces pouring forth from Christ‘s opened side on the cross and for beholding His glory in His Resurrection and Ascension to the Father. 40 days in the wilderness, starting Ash Wednesday, when we receive the mark of the cross in ashes on our foreheads, the priest saying:
“Memento, homo, quia pulvis es, et in pulverem reverteris.“ – “Remember, man, that thou art dust, and into dust thou shalt return.”
Liturgy for Ash Wednesday
Yet, as I said, the liturgy of the Church knows us so well that it is mindful to prepare us for the preparation: Three Sundays before Ash Wednesday, on the Sunday called Septuagesima, the priests already start wearing robes in the color of the Church‘s two extended seasons of fasting (Advent, Lent), in violet. Three Sundays before Ash Wednesday the readings of the Mass already start to reflect the call to repentance and penance. We get led into the Lenten season gently, gradually, step by step. It is brought to the forefront of our minds that 40 days of fasting, of praying, and of almsgiving are right around the corner, are about to begin soon – and that we have to prepare ourselves for it.
With Ash Wednesday falling on the 26th February this year, we are by now already in the middle of the preparation for the preparation of the Paschal tide. High time to get ready.
The 70 days of the season starting with Septuagesima reflect Israel‘s 70 years of exile in Babylon. In his treatise on Psalm 148, Saint Augustine of Hippo explains that there are “two ages“: an age of trial, our lives now, and an age of rest and eternal joy, our lives in glory. Pesach marks the turning of the tide from a time reflecting our Babylonian exile (the Lenten season) to a time of rejoicing about our return to Zion, about the opening of the gates to Jerusalem. Before Pesach we fast, after Pesach we do not fast but live in the sweet foretaste of the age to come.
In order to get ready for our 40 days in the wilderness, let us take a look at the three traditional pillars of the Lenten season, one step at a time: fasting, prayer, almsgiving.
Fasting
“Fasting cleanses the soul, raises the mind, subjects one’s flesh to the spirit, renders the heart contrite and humble, scatters the clouds of concupiscence, quenches the fire of lust, and kindles the true light of chastity. Enter again into yourself.“
Saint Augustine of Hippo
Traditionally, every Wednesday and every Friday are days of fasting, and it is very likely that the more we integrate fasting into each and every week of the year, the easier will it be for us to transition into a period of time that is almost completely dedicated to fasting.
Such is the traditional practice of Lent: to fast on all the days of the week, except on Sundays, which means to live on only one simple and filling meal a day, and to abstain from meat on every Wednesday and Friday. It is a very modern and recent idea propagated by many that we do not have to cut back on our intake of food during Lent, but could apply fasting to other things, like going without some other form of consumption we are used to. While the latter might be good to do as well, it makes a lot of sense that the former should still be the rocksolid basis of it all, something we should not skip: Fasting in all ages and all cultures explicitly means to abstain from food, precisely because food is so important and vital and pleasurable for us.
Let us recall that Adam’s and Eve‘s sin of transgressing the confines of God’s good and merciful commandments was to pluck a fruit from a tree that “was good to eat, and fair to the eyes, and delightful to behold“ (Genesis 3: 6) – the sin of rejecting the one sole limitation that was laid on them – to exert all their authority under God‘s authority and not on their own – , through which death entered into the world: “for dust thou art, and into dust thou shalt return“ (Genesis 3: 19).
Saint Augustine‘s words on the benefits of fasting quoted above render the main purpose of this practice clear to us: a cleansing of body and soul and a disciplining of body and soul. Whatever we do with our bodies, affects our hearts and minds, affects our souls, as well. When we chastise our body, not always immediately giving to it all that it wants and with the taste and flavor it prefers, we train our bodies for chastity in all respects. Besides our drive for food there is another well-known drive in us closely linked to it, insofar as they are both natural and vital and as their satisfaction grants us pleasure. But where there are pleasurable feelings, there is always the risk of overindulgence, dependence, and addiction.
Fasting humbles us the way limitations always do and it makes us more thankful for the grace of this one meal we do receive each day. It is a practice that helps us getting into a spirit of repentance, becoming mindful of our weakness and our sinfulness, and enhances our capability for patiently persevering in all things, among them persevering in prayer. With a lighter body and a cleared mind, it is much easier to raise our soul to God in prayer – and to find our main satisfaction and comfort in our relationship with Him, and not in perishable things.
Fasting, contrary to what we might expect, does not make us spiritually weaker, but stronger. And whatever we do with Christ and in Christ is an easy yoke, even when it is hard, because in all things He has already carried all the heavy weight: He fasted 40 days in the wilderness, and we fast 40 days with and in Him.
And lest we forget: fasting always prepares us for feasting and elevates feasting to an outstanding moment of grateful joy, like the six ordinary days prepare us for our day of rest in the Lord, and like Israel was prepared in the desert for taking possession of the land of milk and honey.
“When the Lord brought back the captivity of Sion, we became like men comforted. Then was our mouth filled with gladness; and our tongue with joy. Then shall they say among the Gentiles: The Lord hath done great things for them. The Lord hath done great things for us: we are become joyful. Turn again our captivity, O Lord, as a stream in the south. They that sow in tears shall reap in joy. Going they went and wept, casting their seeds. But coming they shall come with joyfulness, carrying their sheaves.“
Psalm 125
Praying
Praying, just like breathing, is for all seasons, for each and every day of our lives. Yet, Lent is a season specifically dedicated to extended and intensified prayer. Fasting and praying shall always go together. Fasting frees us for prayer.
Traditionally one meditates on the penitential psalms in Sacred Scripture (Psalm 6, 32, 38, 51, 102, 130, 143), so that we may get prepared for turning from our sins and returning to our God, which finds a sacramental expression in at least one Confession we are called to make during the weeks before Pesach.
And walking with Christ into the mysteries of His Passion, we pray the Sorrowful Mysteries of the Rosary, meditate the stations of the Cross, and the wounds Christ bore for us, and contemplate the Songs of the Suffering Servant in the book of Isaiah.
Whatever kind of devotion circumcises our hearts and bends our knees might be good to take up during Lent. Praying for the living and the dead is one of the seven spiritual works of mercy, to which we should give special attention at this time.
Almsgiving
Almsgiving is one of those really misunderstood practices, I guess. We just don‘t get this word and its substance any more in our modern world. Basically it means acts of charity. It is helpful to remind ourselves of the seven corporal and the seven spiritual works of mercy the Church warmly recommends us to heed especially during Lent, but of course so that the good yeast of Lent might permeate the dough of our whole year: Feed the hungry, give drink to the thirsty, clothe the naked, shelter the homeless, visit the sick, visit the imprisoned, bury the dead; counsel the doubtful, instruct the ignorant, admonish sinners, comfort the afflicted, forgive offenses, bear wrongs patiently, pray for the living and the dead.
Therefore we cannot reduce almsgiving to the practice of giving some money to so-called “charity organizations“, though it might certainly be good to give up an increased part of our income and wealth for the well-being of others, maybe also through such channels. But almsgiving is so much more than that. It is active charity done unto others in flesh and blood by our very own hands.
And like fasting and praying it is a good penance for us, able to extinguish sins. Like fasting, our works of mercy render our prayer acceptable to God, so that we may find His mercy.
The archangel Raphael explains to the righteous Tobias how his mercy, prompted by the Lord’s mercy, finds an ever new response in the Lord‘s mercy:
“Prayer is good with fasting and alms more than to lay up treasures of gold: For alms delivereth from death, and the same is that which purgeth away sins, and maketh to find mercy and life everlasting. But they that commit sin and iniquity, are enemies to their own soul. I discover then the truth unto you, and I will not hide the secret from you. When thou didst pray with tears, and didst bury the dead, and didst leave thy dinner, and hide the dead by day in thy house, and bury them by night, I offered thy prayer to the Lord.“
Tobit 12: 8-12
These concrete, flesh-and-blood acts of charity might actually be what is hardest for us to practice. Harder than scheduling our fasting and praying plan for Lent. And how can it look like in the 21st century? Fortunately, there are no dead bodies in our streets in need of a proper and dignified burial. And if you see people run around naked, it is for reasons totally other than poverty.
Sure, we can try to be especially mindful of every homeless beggar on our streets, and the city of Berlin is full of them – mindful to notice them and to give to them generously, not letting our left hand know what our right hand is doing. It is something we should never neglect, yet we can give it a special focus during Lent. And whenever we do it, we need to give indiscriminately – without looking to the state of the person asking us for money, without any judgment.
Some years ago, Pope Francis was critized a lot when he said that we should always give to someone in need and never ask ourselves whether this one is going to spend it on something good and healthy – or rather on alcohol or drugs. He also called upon us to look the one we give to in the eye – to acknowledge his dignity as a person. To give indiscriminately and without finding any fault in our neighbor, even if we can smell his spiritual infirmities, his addictions, from afar, might be against our wordly wisdom. But what else but Pope Francis’ advice could we deduce from these words of Christ?
“You have heard that it hath been said, An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth. But I say to you not to resist evil: but if one strike thee on thy right cheek, turn to him also the other: And if a man will contend with thee in judgment, and take away thy coat, let go thy cloak also unto him. And whosoever will force thee one mile, go with him other two, give to him that asketh of thee and from him that would borrow of thee turn not away.“
Matthew 5: 38-42
Over and over again we have to remind ourselves that giving to our neighbor without judging him is not only the right thing to do in view of his dignity as a person, who is not to be patronized by us, as if we were above him, but that this is the only way to circumcise and humble our hearts and keep the soil of our hearts soft and receptive – really the only way to prevent that our hearts get hardened bit by bit and eventually turn into unempathetic rocks. To have a stone for a heart of flesh is something we should dread more than anything. What we do with our hands always affects our hearts, hardening or softening them, one or the other.
Still, in general it sometimes feels like we are living in a day and age where it is harder than ever to give alms. It seems to be the backside of our modern individualism and our welfare state – a society of “professionally organized charity“ without true love.
To figure out how we can actively do good onto others, showing them mercy – God‘s mercy, is a real and humbling challenge for us in Lent. We live in days where “iniquity hath abounded“, wherefore “the charity of many“, of all of us, has “(grown) cold“ (Matthew 24: 12). Lent is a season of repentance. The Lord is near to lend us His mercy if we have run dry of it – we must, like Rebekkah, go down to the spring and fill our jug, if we shall give drink to the thirsty (Genesis 24: 16). On Pesach, a living spring will open for us – waters gushing forth from the Rock of our salvation.
The other day I made honey pie for my younger cousin‘s birthday. It was sweet and delicious. The next day, she, a pregnant woman close to the moment of delivery, took the leftovers and gave them to a homeless man on the street. He enjoyed honey pie for breakfast and greeted her joyfully when he saw her, who is now ready for her baby to come, passing him by, as she went out for a walk.
“Blessed are the merciful: for they shall obtain mercy.“
Matthew 5: 7
Of princes and beggars
Finally, let us take a close look at this wonderful painting depicting a carneval prince, who indulged in pie and wine and immodesties much worse than that just a few hours ago, and is now sitting in an empty and lonely chamber, is now – on Ash Wednesday – a beggar before God. Let us begin to get ready: soon, all shall be reversed again.
