As I enter into the first full week of my Lenten journey I am pretty aware of the fact that I am distracted, tired and prefer doing something, anything other than focusing on the renewing of my faith which is one of the purposes of Lent. I may be one of those who suffer from SADD or SAHDD -- Spiritual Attention Deficit Disorder/Spiritual Attention Hyperactivity Deficit Disorder. Even though I have been practicing Centering Prayer and focused prayer for several years now, I still find it hard at times to be still and focus on the present moment and my relationship with God. Maybe you have the same problem.
If so, you and I are among the 99%. No, not the occupy Wall Street 99%, although I support their cause, but the 99% David Steindl-Rast refers to when he says: "Ninety-nine percent of the time we have an opportunity to be grateful for something. We just don't notice it. We go through our days in a daze".
I hate to admit it. But that’s me – going through my days in a daze. And because I am in a daze – either due to stress, or laziness, or lack of sleep or lack of intention or attention, I miss so much of what God wants to teach me and what life is all about. I miss so much to be grateful for.
That really is why I need Lent. It provides some structure to my life – forty days beginning with Ash Wednesday and running through Easter. It is punctuated with Sundays that remind me of the challenges and blessings of the journey and begins to come to an end with Palm Sunday, Maundy Thursday* and Good Friday. I have devotional guides and the church to help with my journey. And the journey is all about slowing down, focusing and learning to see, again.
Juliet Benner reminds us that: “Spirituality is all about seeing. It is becoming aware of realities in which we are immersed but of which we are unaware….Spiritual vision requires learning to notice the presence of God within and around us.”
The Lenten journey, the spiritual journey, is all about learning to see, having our eyes opened to the wonder and the glory of life and God’s presence in it. It is about learning gratitude and to say alleluia! The 18th century French Catholic Jesuit writer Jean-Pierre de Caussade, who is best known for his work Abandonment to Divine Providence (also translated as The Sacrament of the Present Moment), reminds us that “The present moment is always full of infinite treasures, it contains far more than you have the capacity to hold. Faith is the measure; what you find in the present moment will be according to the measure of your faith.” Thomas Merton says the same thing: “We are living in a world that is absolutely transparent, and God is shining through all the time.” And if I still didn’t hear it, there are other voices. The writer Frederick Buechner: “Listen to your life. See it for the fathomless mystery that it is…There is no event so commonplace but that God is present within it, always leaving you room to recognize or not to recognize him.” The theologian, Augustine: “God is always present to us and all things; it is that we, like blind persons, do not have eyes to see.”
The world around us, and the life we live in it, is saturated, alive with grace, if we have eyes to see. In fact, if the above voices and centuries of Christian witnesses are to be believed, there is more than we could ever hope to see. But let’s admit it – it is hard to really believe this. Our world of work, messy relationships, challenging classes, global and local tensions, economic concerns, health issues, etc. and etc., make it hard to believe that this world is “full of infinite treasures.”
This brings us back to this thing called “faith.” J.P. de Caussade reminds us that: “Faith is the measure; what you find in the present moment will be according to the measure of your faith.” A weak or shallow faith, a distracted or wrongfully preoccupied faith will find very little of meaning and evidence of the Divine in the present moment. Lent helps us to cultivate the faith that enables us to see. It grabs us by the collar and sits us down and takes our face in its hands and says: “Look! Look at what God is doing in the world and look at what God is doing in your life!”
Faith for the journey, is the willingness to trust God. Faith, in the Biblical sense, is fundamentally trust. It is trust in the character, the integrity, the care and compassion of God. It rests on the testimony of Scripture and Church – men and women who have come to know God in and through the rough and tumble experiences of life. For some, faith is robust and growing, for others it is weak and struggling. I like what Thomas Merton once said about faith. In one of his journals he is describing his many distractions, his weaknesses and the many things that can draw him away from God: “I am happy that I can at least want to love God. Perhaps that is all I’ve got, but it is already all that is essential. And He will take care of the rest.” Faith believes that in Jesus we meet one who knows our struggles, our pain, our experience of emptiness and abandonment, of growing faith and ebbing faith, and he still loves us and will work with that faith to bring us to maturity, if we want.
“What Will We Pay Attention To?” That really is the big question. The world and we are filled with so much noise, so many voices calling for our attention and time. We are constantly bombarded with images and sights that are supposed to tempt us, wow us, tease us, satisfy us. How are we to hear and see in this vast sea of stimulation? And more specifically, how are we to see and hear and experience God in our midst? Lent helps us to cultivate a listening ear, to sharpen our vision, to sensitize our soul to the presence of the Holy in our midst.
One practical way to do that is to begin with gratitude. Many of us think that gratitude comes from happiness, but David Steindl-Rast reminds us that “It is not happiness that makes us grateful, but it is gratefulness that makes us happy.”
So, let me suggest that for the next week in your Lenten journey you try this exercise. When you wake up in the morning, instead of saying something like “Oh God! It is morning.”; try staying still for a moment and saying or thinking) “Thank you God for this morning!” A grateful start to the morning can lead to a full day of gratitude; and turned into a daily practice, this grateful beginning creates a grateful life.
For the week, devote at least five to ten minutes each morning to considering life's gifts to you. If you already have or can set aside a special morning meditation time, great! If you have to go to work early or have classes or are immediately plunged into parenting duties or taking care of an invalid, choose some reminder — the first time you take a sip of a beverage in the morning; a chime on your cell phone; the coming to a stop at a red light; getting on or off the bus or train; something—to think of three things for which you are grateful. And then turn your awareness of your gifts into a time of prayer – thank God for the gifts in your life. And look for opportunities to tell someone. Maybe it will challenge them to see the giftedness of life and the graciousness of God.
Some other things to think about: 1) Is your life filled with too much noise to hear God? What are some things you could do that would free up some space to breathe deeply again? You might want to talk with a trusted friend about your decision to do less; 2) What do you think God delights in when God thinks about you? Why does God think that you were special enough to send Jesus for you? What is your response to this grace?
===========*Also known as Holy Thursday, Covenant Thursday, Great & Holy Thursday, and Thursday of Mysteries, is the Christian feast or holy day falling on the Thursday before Easter that commemorates the Last Supper of Jesus Christ with the Apostles as described in the Gospels ( Mark 14:12-25; Matthew 26:17-19; Luke 22:7-13). It is the fifth day of Holy Week, and is preceded by Holy Wednesday and followed by Good Friday.
