Inbox Inspiration: Lent: March 27 - April 10, 2019

March 27, 2019

Lent - Sacrifice

Dear Friends,
As I look back on my childhood, I recall that my parents gave up a lot for my brother and me.
They gave up buying new cars and going out to dinner often and many other things.
And they did this out of love for my brother and me.
They wanted, above all, to give us the best education possible.
They sacrificed for us.
Usually, during Lent we are encouraged to give up something.
That something might be chocolate, desserts, beer, pizza, soft drinks, or whatever.
We are to do this giving up, this sacrifice, out of love for God.
We may do this as a way of repenting for sin.
Or we may do it as a self-discipline, a way to grow in our strength to avoid evil and do good.
But beyond these motives, we sacrifice during Lent because we recognize the One who is above and beyond us.
We sacrifice out of love for the Divine Other, for God.
So, as with the personal sacrifices made by my parents and probably also yours, our Lenten sacrifice is very other-centered.
It is a statement that there is something, Someone beyond us for whom we live.
 “When you make a sacrifice, you don’t just give something up, you acknowledge a realm greater than yourself. ‘Sacrifice’ means ‘to make sacred.’ You go beyond self. You make room for a greater mystery.”
From Dark Nights of the Soul by Thomas Moore (1940 –. American, author, psychotherapist and Doctor of Religious Studies).
[For more reflections on Lenten themes, see the next two Inbox Inspirations, April 3 and 10.]
May we be transformed more and more fully into the likeness of God, through Christ our Lord. Amen.
Father Michael Schleupner

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April 3, 2019

Lent - Prayer

Dear Friends,
Back in the seventh century, Saint John Damascene defined prayer as
“…the lifting up of our minds and hearts to God.”
Many of us, including me, learned this in our faith formation classes.
There is much richness in this definition.
The idea is that prayer is the centering of our inner self on God.
It is being aware of the longing in our hearts for God –
for being close to God, for having God be present with us right now.
It is the focusing of our awareness –
in one sense, beyond ourselves, on the One from whom we have come,
but in another sense, on ourselves, on the One who is at the core of our being.
Above and beyond anything else, our prayer is simply being with God.
Whatever words we say or whatever passages we read,
prayer is being with God.
God is already there – here – with us – within us.
The Season of Lent calls us to make sure that we pray.
What this really means is that we are to lift up our minds and hearts, open our inner selves simply to being with God.
“…prayer contains an impulse towards simplicity. Prayer can be a ‘being with’…Beyond praise, petition, or begging for pardon, the impulse in prayer is towards presence, being with, being with the person…In the gospels people do indeed ask Jesus for things... But there is a deeper movement, expressed by the attitude of sinners whose concern is to ‘sit with’ him (Mark 2:15).”
From The Impact of God by Father Iain Matthew (1940 –. British, Carmelite priest, Doctoral Degree from Oxford, author, chaplain, retreat director).
[For more reflections on Lenten themes, see the Inbox Inspirations for last week, March 27, and for next week April 10.]
May we be transformed more and more fully into the likeness of God, through Christ our Lord. Amen.
Father Michael Schleupner

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April 10, 2019

Lent - Charity

Dear Friends, 
Our traditional Lenten practices are fasting, prayer, and charity.
We hear Jesus speaking of these in chapter six of the Gospel of Matthew.
I see fasting or personal sacrifice and prayer as leading to charity.
So, when we sacrifice or give up something – snacks between meals, beef, candy – when we do this, we choose some physical self-denial.
One of the effects of this choice of going without something is to put us in touch with those who go without life’s necessities without any choice in the matter.
It puts us, at least spiritually, in touch with those who are hungry or homeless or without health care and without hope.
Again, when we pray, we lift up our minds and hearts to God who is love itself.
One of the effects of this is to put us in touch with the compassion of Jesus.
It puts us in touch with those in need who were always primary in Jesus’ ministry.
So, our sacrifice and prayer during Lent lead us to charity.
They lead us to look and see those who are in need.
They move us to treat them as our brothers and sisters, as God’s daughters and sons.

“Charity is the live wire along which the power of God, indwelling our finite spirits, can and does act on other souls and other things, rescuing, healing, giving support and light. Such secret intercessory prayer ought to penetrate and accompany all our active work. It is the supreme expression of the spiritual life on earth. It moves from God to others through us, because we have ceased to be self-centered units, but are woven into the great fabric of praying souls, the mystical body through which the work of Christ on earth goes on being done.”

From Common Prayer: A Liturgy for Ordinary Radicals by Evelyn Underhill (1875-1941. British, Anglo-Catholic, author on religion and Christian mysticism, retreat director.)

[For more reflections on Lenten themes, see also the Inbox Inspirations for the last two weeks, March 27 and April 3.]

May we be transformed more and more fully into the likeness of God, through Christ our Lord. Amen.
Father Michael Schleupner