I was very glad to have a few articles posted on the Cora Evans blog since the last time I updated this blog. It's too late for my daily Lenten reflections, but here are two others:
In honor of St. Patrick's Day, a reflection on his Breastplate prayer (breastplate = Lorica in Latin). It's a really incredible prayer when you sit with it for a little while. The most well-known part of it is the "Christ behind me, Christ before me" stanza, but the entire prayer is much longer. Worth a read!
For Good Friday, a combination of the physical effects of the crucifixion and some reflections.
Both articles were interesting topics, and I probably learned more in the writing than anyone will in the reading of them.
Reflections of a Catholic layman on the Mass, spirituality, books, and the occasional tangent
Monday, March 28, 2016
Easter is Here and Lent is Gone--I mean, concluded... I mean, Lent is fine, but Easter is glory... I mean...
Every time Easter arrives, the feast is full of joy and glory. It's the resurrection of Our Lord Jesus and the most singular important event in human history! Embedded in the joy is the relief of Lent being over. The St. Francises and St. Ignatiuses have eyes to see suffering as it really is: participation in the Passion of Jesus. I am not in that category. More often than not, I fight it tooth and nail.
An examination of my Lent is always disappointing. I have a strange idea of myself that I should come out of Lent completely purified and perfect. Bad habit x? Eliminated! Evangelism efforts? Tripled! Sacred Scripture? Memorized, contemplated, and able to answer every possible question! It took a few years to come to peace with this high expectations "false me." Dealing with that kind of unrealistic expectation has one primary peril: I inadvertently assumed that I would be doing the serious heavy lifting. Grace, the Holy Spirit, yeah yeah, but it was I that had to fix things. There was no possible way I could ever live up to my own expectations, especially if I relied more on myself rather than God. That disastrous approach has two outcomes: apathy or an OCD approach (although not in the Carmelite sense). The former, why even bother if I can't do it?, leads to sloth. The latter, being anxious and over-scrupulous, leads to even further pride. I settled for some apathetic Lents in the past, and they didn't do me any lasting good.
The key is to avoid pride and hit the mark in between two extremes, as our friend Aristotle would say. Approach Lent with humility--knowing from the beginning our weakness and inability to fix everything ourselves in 40 days. Also, I think a targeted approach helps during Lent. In the past, I fasted just to fast. It's that thing we do during Lent, right? Instead, target a particular weakness and fast toward that end. And, to be clear, it should be a spiritual end. Fasting from a particular food for the sake of losing weight has some spiritual merit, but it's misdirected.
This year, my wife and I decided to give up sweets. That practice was my go-to for Lent from my childhood all the way up until college. I hadn't fasted from sweets for a number of years; trying this year proved more difficult than I expected. There are two somewhat embarrassing episodes that highlight this...
First, my wife made dinner for some friends who recently had a baby; there were some leftover cookies. I have some Irish heritage and love St. Patrick, so we agreed that a single, leftover cookie on that day would be ok. Leading up to St. Patrick's feast day, I found myself craving that cookie. That was accompanied by a sobering thought: have I ever had such fervor for the Eucharist? Seriously, I looked forward to a cookie more than the Body of Christ?
Second, my wife and I started the Divine Mercy Novena on Good Friday. Halfway through the prayer for the day, my mind wandered (in itself, not uncommon)... to breakfast the next day. Sausage or bacon? Eggs, for sure... are we out of English muffins?
Yikes. We both had the realization that, for one, this was a well-aimed penance for the weakness of our appetite for sweets. In addition, that appetite was stronger than I initially thought.
I believe our fasting did us a lot of good, and it provided an opportunity to become more humble than before. To close, here's a passage from St. John Chrysostum. For everything that changes in the world, human nature does not. These words sound like he's talking directly to me:
An examination of my Lent is always disappointing. I have a strange idea of myself that I should come out of Lent completely purified and perfect. Bad habit x? Eliminated! Evangelism efforts? Tripled! Sacred Scripture? Memorized, contemplated, and able to answer every possible question! It took a few years to come to peace with this high expectations "false me." Dealing with that kind of unrealistic expectation has one primary peril: I inadvertently assumed that I would be doing the serious heavy lifting. Grace, the Holy Spirit, yeah yeah, but it was I that had to fix things. There was no possible way I could ever live up to my own expectations, especially if I relied more on myself rather than God. That disastrous approach has two outcomes: apathy or an OCD approach (although not in the Carmelite sense). The former, why even bother if I can't do it?, leads to sloth. The latter, being anxious and over-scrupulous, leads to even further pride. I settled for some apathetic Lents in the past, and they didn't do me any lasting good.
The key is to avoid pride and hit the mark in between two extremes, as our friend Aristotle would say. Approach Lent with humility--knowing from the beginning our weakness and inability to fix everything ourselves in 40 days. Also, I think a targeted approach helps during Lent. In the past, I fasted just to fast. It's that thing we do during Lent, right? Instead, target a particular weakness and fast toward that end. And, to be clear, it should be a spiritual end. Fasting from a particular food for the sake of losing weight has some spiritual merit, but it's misdirected.
This year, my wife and I decided to give up sweets. That practice was my go-to for Lent from my childhood all the way up until college. I hadn't fasted from sweets for a number of years; trying this year proved more difficult than I expected. There are two somewhat embarrassing episodes that highlight this...
First, my wife made dinner for some friends who recently had a baby; there were some leftover cookies. I have some Irish heritage and love St. Patrick, so we agreed that a single, leftover cookie on that day would be ok. Leading up to St. Patrick's feast day, I found myself craving that cookie. That was accompanied by a sobering thought: have I ever had such fervor for the Eucharist? Seriously, I looked forward to a cookie more than the Body of Christ?
Second, my wife and I started the Divine Mercy Novena on Good Friday. Halfway through the prayer for the day, my mind wandered (in itself, not uncommon)... to breakfast the next day. Sausage or bacon? Eggs, for sure... are we out of English muffins?
Yikes. We both had the realization that, for one, this was a well-aimed penance for the weakness of our appetite for sweets. In addition, that appetite was stronger than I initially thought.
I believe our fasting did us a lot of good, and it provided an opportunity to become more humble than before. To close, here's a passage from St. John Chrysostum. For everything that changes in the world, human nature does not. These words sound like he's talking directly to me:
"Sharpen your sickle, which you have blunted through gluttony— sharpen it by fasting. Lay hold of the pathway which leads towards heaven; rugged and narrow as it is, lay hold of it, and journey on. And how may thou be able to do these things? By subduing your body, and bringing it into subjection. For when the way grows narrow, the corpulence that comes of gluttony is a great hindrance. Keep down the waves of inordinate desires. Repel the tempest of evil thoughts. Preserve the bark; display much skill, and you have become a pilot. But we shall have the fast for a groundwork and instructor in all these things." (Homilies on the Statutes, Homily III, #7)
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