Reflection for Ash Wednesday

Sister Mary Elizabeth Schweiger distributing ashes on Ash Wednesday.

From the Prologue of the Rule of St. Benedict, we hear the words, “But as we progress in this way of life in faith, we shall run on the path of God’s commandments, our hearts overflowing with the inexpressible delight of love.” During Lent, Benedict encourages us in that run to “let each one deny ourselves some food, drink, sleep, needless talking and idle jesting, and look forward to holy Easter with joy and spiritual longing” (chapter. 49, vs.7.) Our Lenten fasting and prayer are tools to enable us to see our goal, to run to the very heart of God.

One of the few creatures on earth that can out-jump Michael Jordon is the absolutely amazing impala. It is an African deer with a supercharged spring. It has the capacity to make a vertical leap of over 10 feet and can broad jump over 30 feet. To put that in perspective, an impala could jump up almost as high as our gazebo and over it with no trouble. They are very, very fast and can outrun most of their predators. They keep their eyes way ahead of themselves and have good eyesight.

You would think that the zoos of the world would find it impossible to keep such an animal enclosed. Not so. It is rather easy. The experts discovered something about the impala. It will not jump unless it can see where it is going to land. Therefore, a solid wall, even only 6 feet tall, is sufficient to keep it enclosed.

It does not attempt to run or jump if it has walls around it. In these zoos, it cannot be who it is meant to be.

Lent invites us to look at and examine the personal walls that we have put around ourselves. These walls are built of selfishness, greed, judgmentalism, insensitivity, and lack of humility to be vulnerable. Our hearts become hardened, and we build barriers to keep others out. We enclose ourselves in such a way that we cannot be who God wants us to be.

There are walls that divide us as a community. When we cling to past hurts and refuse to forgive one another, we put another brick in our wall. When we hold on to grudges or criticize others, we make our walls stronger. These walls keep us from living our potential as a community.

As a nation and society, we have built walls along our borders to keep immigrants out. There are walls down the aisles of our congressional meeting halls. There are invisible walls that separate races, neighbors and cultures.

But all these walls keep us from living up to our potential as a nation.

Lent is a time for us to break down some of these walls by fasting, almsgiving, prayer, and reconciling with those we have hurt or who have hurt us. We are invited to build bridges by writing our congress people and by engaging in conversations with those who think differently than we do. We are challenged to embrace one another in love and compassion.

I think we are called this lent to be impalas. As the walls around us fall down through our Lenten practices, we can see where we want to land, we can see the prize. We can run our monastic way of life with zeal, enthusiasm, trust, hope, resilience and hearts full of love. We can bring hope and vision to our world through relentlessness that never gives up. Our goal is to land in the very heart of Jesus, who has suffered and died for us to bring us salvation and Easter joy. Our prize is to live our potential to the fullest. Our reward is our heavenly home.