The word Lent comes from the Old German “Lenz”, meaning “spring.” It is related to the Anglo-Saxon “lenct,” which means “to lengthen,” referring to the lengthening of the hours of daylight in the northern hemisphere as spring approaches. Since ancient times the season
has been a natural time of fasting, as winter stores become depleted, cured and dried meats are used up, and spring lambs are not yet old enough to slaughter.
The Christian tradition has used this natural time of austerity as a preparation for the new life of Easter and also as a time of catechesis for candidates for baptism. Lent is a time of intentional journey into wilderness and out again, a time of turning and returning to God, to the center, the ground, a return to needful things.
This blog is an invitation to step into the journey of Lent with intentionality and awareness by taking on a traditional Lenten discipline: fasting for the good of the body, prayer for the good of the spirit, acts of love for the good of the neighbor. You are invited to make a covenant for the season, to take on a daily prayer time, the reading of scripture, physical and spiritual activity. You are invited to make this journey as individuals and as community, joining in worship and service and small
group study. May we turn together and begin to re-orient toward the rising Sun of the Easter dawn.
"Lent calls each of us to renew our ongoing commitment to the implications of the Resurrection in our own lives here and now. But that demands both the healing of the soul and the honing of the soul, both penance and faith, both a purging of what is superfluous in our lives and the heightening, the intensifying, of what is meaningful…It is the act of beginning our spiritual life all over again refreshed and reoriented."
(Joan Chittister)
