Lenten Letter
Saint John's Church

Lent 2004

Dear Members and Friends,

In the life of the Church we have begun the time we call 'Lent'. The word comes from the Old English 'lencten', which referred to the observable lengthening of daylight hours. The Church's celebration of Lent is in many ways a mirror of what is going on outside in nature. There the ground is hard and brown, the days are cold, the trees are without the ornament of leaf or fruit, the only birdsong is the harsh voice of the crow. Still, the light is lengthening, and ever so slowly warmth intrudes upon the kingdom of ice and snow. Nature stirs from subtle to glorious new birth. Inside, the church building's lack of ornament, the Liturgy's austerity, the discordant chill of Lenten music is like the hard days outside. But, like lengthening daylight, the story of Christ's heated ministry and then his Passion, Death and Resurrection is told through the Scriptures. The Light of the Good News of God in Christ unfolds, lengthens, and transforms, bringing new birth and life.

This movement from dark to Light, this Lent, is often called a 'journey'. By this is meant that we ourselves seem to walk with Jesus as we hear the lessons of the Liturgy and as we make our acts of personal devotion. We seem to make the journey with him through his preaching ministry, his Passion, his Death and Resurrection. As we participate, we walk, we journey, from ignorant darkness to the Light of the truth revealed in him.

In order to keep our wandering minds focused on the journey and on the Light, the Church encourages us to make daily personal acts of real piety and generosity on all the weekdays of Lent. It traditionally puts fish (an early Christian symbol of Christ) on faithful tables on each Wednesday to remind us of the betrayal of Jesus on that night (traditionally the Gospel reading on Wednesday in Holy Week), and on each Friday to remind us of the horrible price which sin exacts (Good Friday). Abstinence from ordinary pleasures throughout Lent keeps us in mind of both the seriousness of what the Light reveals and, more importantly, the many joys which already bless and fill our lives, but which we so take for granted. Obligatory fasting on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday are perhaps the most potent reminders of those things, but they are also a sharp 'attention getter' as we begin and come to the close of the time of Lent.

Far from sin and its darkness, the focus of Lent is on the Light, on understanding Jesus, our relationship to and with him, and through him, on our life within the life of God. The culmination of Lent in Easter's Resurrection is not just for Jesus; the whole point of the Passion and Resurrection is that they are for us. We, too, undergo a kind of death to self and resurrection. Grasping that, and living it, seems to be the hard part for most of us. Lent is there to help us 'get it'. It is not a bunch of rules and hoops to jump through so that we can say we have done it and earn God's favour. We already have his favour; that's why his Son died for us. The goal of Lent is the dawning and deepening embodiment of the love of God for us and in us. Lent's tools- alms-giving, study, more prayer, meditation upon Scripture, fasting- are all for that purpose alone. They take us out of our self-absorption and help us see ourselves as God might, so that we can be re-created in love, as love incarnate, just like Jesus: a light to the world.

I hope this Lent will be a time of growing in and into the Light for you. To assist you, I invite you to join us, first, for the Ash Wednesday Service at the Church on 25 February at 6.30 PM. Then, the Penitential Procession, which our choir will sing at the Roman Catholic Cathedral of Mary Our Queen, on Sunday, 29 February, the first Sunday in Lent at 6.30 PM, makes a dramatic living symbol of our Lenten journey. Lenten study is on Wednesdays at 7.15 PM in the church. On Fridays at 6.30 PM in the Lady Chapel, you are invited to spend one simple, quiet, holy hour in the presence of Jesus in the Sacrament, which he himself left to us as a perpetual remembrance of his precious death and sacrifice, until his coming again. Do make the most of these opportunities.

May peace and Lent's quiet joys fill and fulfil you all,

(The Rev'd) Jesse L. A. Parker
Rector of Saint John's Church, Huntingdon,
Waverly, Baltimore