A few days ago, while giving a talk on Ash Wednesday, I shared my Lenten experiences with the group that I was giving the talk to. One of the things that I shared is that very often my Lent is shot because there were so many things to do and so little time to reflect on what is the true meaning of Lent.
A few days after that, a friend of mine forwarded an article that spoke of doing less for more. That definitely struck a chord with me and certainly with her. Every year at Lent, we start planning for activities. We fall into the believe that in doing all these activities, we will be able to deepen our Lenten experience and therefore grow closer to God. But how true is that, really?
The writer, in his article, wrote that “Over the last few years, I’ve been struck by how much Lent has become something to do, something that requires action and energy from us, that requires thinking, planning, organising, and executing. I’ve seen some parishes where the handbook of Lenten activities looks like a prospectus for a graduate program in theology, with bible studies, book clubs, speakers, musical performances and the like.”
Certainly sounds familiar, don’t you think?
We treat Lent as a season where we must do something that very often we forget that Lent is also a season of being. For many of us, not doing anything is a sign that we are idle, that we are not making the best use of the season to get closer to God. One question that we need that we need to ask ourselves is this; will doing more things bring us closer to God?
When we organise an activity, we expand a lot of energy and time, in the planning and also the execution of the activity. Very often, we end up getting frustrated and stressed. Speaking from personal experience, there were times when I just wanted to blow up. We always end up having the same people organising the same activity, one reason being “you’ve done it before, so you are more experienced”. I find that reason a very lame one. To me, it’s just a way of saying “I want the activity but don’t ask me to organise it”
Lent is a time for our personal journey of conversion back to God. We begin our journey on Ash Wednesday, putting ashes on our forehead to signify our repentance and we rise again in glory with our Risen Lord on Easter Vigil. We die to ourselves and to our sins throughout Lent and are washed anew by the waters of baptism during Easter.
If we have so much to do and so much to attend to, how will we be able to make this journey or conversion and reconciliation? We rush here and there and end up tiring ourselves and having no energy to pray. Is this an effective way of a Lenten journey?
Some years back, I wrote an article on the need for silence. We love to surround ourselves with sound and sight, anything that can drown the silence around us. But silence is necessary if we want God to speak to us. God cannot reach us when there is chaos and noise in and around us. If we fill up our space with activities upon activities, where will God fit in?
We define ourselves in terms of achievements and accomplishments. We live in a future-oriented culture that relates time largely to efficiency and productivity. We are more inclined than ever to use time to accomplish results than to enhance relationships.
The focus of the Christian life should not be deeds and actions, but a relationship; it is not centred on a product, but on a Person. It is a matter of abiding in Christ Jesus, rather than fulfilling a set of religious formulae.
If we truly want to deepen our relationship with God and our own personal prayer life, we need to learn to slow down, to learn to be comfortable with silence and inactivity. That is the challenge that lies before us this season of Lent and every season of Lent that is to come. The question, then, is whether we dare to take up this challenge of doing less for more.
“In repentance and rest you will be saved, in quietness and trust is your strength” (Isaiah 30:15).
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