Fr. Don's Daily Reflection
Ash Wednesday
As we begin Lent, many of us could do better than "I will give up my daily beer/ cheesecake/ watching 'True Detective'/ etc." How about enlivening my life in Christ with some daily and personal – that is, unique to me – prayer? Public prayers, like those in the Mass, become mechanical and remain formal unless they’re accompanied daily by personal, private prayer. More often than not it is you or me who is standoffish in our relation with Jesus. He demonstrated real neighborliness by taking on our flesh and life and even more than “his” share of suffering. The Lord Jesus is easily available in the Eucharist, in Scripture, in our fellow human beings and in all of nature. Everything else we might think of for Lent is, I think, fairly petty compared to developing a genuinely personal prayer life. (If yours is blazing ahead and well advanced, you need to find something else to read!)
If Lent is about restoring and renewing my relationship with God, that can only be done using some of my language, with some daily discussion of my needs, my hopes, my worries, my failures. This is the kind of communication – and even silence – that exists between friends. No one else is going to renew my baptismal promises at Easter. The prayers of the Mass are for a gathering of individuals, purposely applicable to everyone present, while being unique to no one. They are somewhat like our "how do you do," or "how’s it going?" or "good morning.” Only a prayer like that of writer Anne Lamott, "Lord, help me not to be such a jerk" can come from my unique self-knowledge and experience. With such frankness and familiarity we’re on the way to genuine and liberating trust in the Lord.