Lent

In the time before the Lord’s Passion—the time the Church calls “Lent”—she invites all the faithful to prepare themselves for the coming period of suffering. This preparation can’t be a matter of the Christian’s indiscreetly pushing his way into the innermost recesses of the Passion and its mysteries. The point is rather for him to stick to his everyday activity and prayer and try to understand in a spirit of reverence what the Lord took upon himself for him, for the Church, and for the whole world. He might read a Gospel passage, especially a scene from the Passion narratives—something one can do in any situation of life—and take the truth it reveals into his job. That, in fact, is the important thing. It’s not about being caught up for a few minutes here and there by the Lenten atmosphere. That’s much too sporadic. No, the spirit of Lent needs to govern one’s daily life—not as a pious ideal, but in a real way.

Let’s take an example. You read that the Lord predicted his Passion in advance, thus inviting the faithful to take their part in it. Since everything he did then remains alive for us now, we should try to hear this prediction as a word addressed to us, as a challenge to see his approaching Passion in every event that presses upon him—and so in everything that happens to us as well. But let’s not forget: It is his Passion that is approaching—today, this Lent—and it’s his Passion we’re preparing for, not ours. There’s no question of seriously comparing our petty, trivial concerns with his Passion, as if these small adversities and sacrifices could be a part of his suffering. We contemplate his word, not ours, his Passion, not ours, and we are filled with his approaching destiny, not ours, which, however it may turn out, is not what has to be interesting for us. The Lord’s Passion, its ceaselessly renewed relevance, is the platform from which we turn our gaze towards ourselves, our times, our contemporary Church and try with his eyes to discover what today causes him suffering, what today moves him to mount the Cross. And if there’s something in ourselves, in the Church, or in the world that we can change in order to spare the Lord some suffering, we will do it. We won’t talk about it as our merit, or our suffering, or our sacrifice. No, we will be acutely conscious that the Lord has done superabundantly more than enough for all sins, for all that’s wrong, intolerable, and offensive to God. We’ll also avoid falling back into the habit of taking personal offense at all these things, as if we couldn’t stand them, as if we had to change them. What we’ll do with this scandalous, offensive state of affairs in ourselves, the world, and the Church, instead is relate it back to his vision, his sacrifice and suffering. Rather than measure it by our criteria, we’ll measure it by his, which are the truest, the most serious, and the most demanding criteria there are. That said, it’s important for the Lord to see that we have understood his invitation. He needs to see by our active will to get involved, to help, to bear what requires bearing and to change what requires changing, that we are his disciples. The fact that he is going to die is the least of his sufferings. What makes him suffer is the sin of the world, especially the sin of his friends, of his closest associates who deny and betray him. The ultimate suffering, though, is that all of this so deeply offends the Father. As he suffers his Passion, he doesn’t think about himself. Indeed, he couldn’t suffer redemptively if he were thinking about himself. Which is why, the more seriously we aim to be involved in his Passion, the less we must think of ourselves.

Jesus predicted his Passion in order to give his disciples an opportunity to join him in preparing for it. But he also created an even deeper unity as well. On the night before his Passion, he instituted the Eucharist and gave it the form of his coming suffering: He hands his disciples his body given up and his shed blood. By indwelling their inmost being now, even before his Passion, he initiates them into the inmost spirit and attitude of his Passion as well. They’re not supposed to be uninvolved bystanders as he suffers and dies. Through their eucharistic union with him they are to participate as intimately as possible in his condition. And the fact that he immediately leads them out to the Mount of Olives after their first communion means that he can disclose to them his inner suffering with more confidence than before. He “begins to be sad and troubled,” and he invites them “to watch and pray with him.” True, they disappoint him by falling asleep and failing to comprehend what is happening, and he must chide them for it. Nevertheless, they fell asleep “out of sadness,” a sadness that they would not have felt unless he had initiated them into his sadness. At the same time, they experience how little man is capable of accompanying the Lord by his own power, how much the Lord will have to suffer to awaken them from sleep, to bring them from their earthly rest, which is the complacency of sin, to his Christian restlessness. The very men who are closest to him and have left everything to follow him are unable even to take the first step into the Passion with him. And realizing this humiliates them so deeply that they have no time to compare their failure with everyone else’s, as if to calculate how much more deeply the rest are sleeping. No, they see their failure, and that’s enough to give them a feeling for his suffering in the Passion.

Lent, then, becomes a time for examination of conscience. We see our permanent failure, our failure already at step one, our constant flight back to our repletion, our complacent rest impatient of disturbance, our personal plans and enthusiasms. The contrast stands starkly revealed in the harsh light of day: All this personal stuff has yet to be surrendered and integrated into his plans, his call, his redemptive way to the Cross. We’re constantly refusing to do what’s his and to let go of what’s ours. Much less perhaps because of round, tangible sins, but because of an entirely egotistical attitude, a tendency to rest in ourselves and relate everything back to ourselves. This attitude may manifest itself in a general lack of love, of interest in, and benevolence towards, others. It may show up in irritability, the assumption of superior knowledge, and critique of, and discontent with, the world and the Church. Or it shows up in our belief that every effort to obey the Lord by praying more or receiving the sacraments more frequently is something good for the religious “specialists,” the “devout,” whereas we can get along just fine with the minimum. But then we hear the Lord’s words: “Watch and pray!” Not later, but now, before he suffers his Passion. When you think about it, Lent is actually so short that we have to get to work without delay if we don’t want to miss out on its graces. Our watching and praying has to start quickly, no: immediately. Nor is it so hard for us after all; at the time the disciples were so grief-stricken that it didn’t occur to them that the Resurrection and Easter would follow soon after. They probably saw only a dark night ahead. We know about Easter. We also know about the fruit of the Lord’s suffering in the Passion. Let’s not make a thousand resolutions for tomorrow, but enter today into the one thing necessary—real, loving accompaniment of the Lord. Let us be captured by his prayer: “Not as I will, Father, but as you will.” Even when it leads to the Cross, “your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.”