Pilgrimage
When I started this short series of reflections, my mind was very much on the fact that Lent and Easter are later this year, and that we were in between the great seasons of the Church’s Year. I have tried to show that being in between times is our human condition. The Kingdom of God is not yet fully revealed to us, and yet, it is already here.
It is in our experiences that we catch glimpses of the presence of God, and the possibilities of our realising something of his promise in the here and now.
The memory of the Church, which is ultimately the Holy Spirit, recalls the great events of creation and redemption, and reminds us that many have travelled along the road to salvation.
The Spirit offers more than a suggestion about some of the best means of ‘transport’.
We are pilgrims.
Experience
Our experiences as human beings are the key to making progress on this pilgrimage.
We can only relate to God and others as human beings – though sometimes I think in the Church we tend to forget this.
There’s a good line in one of the prefaces of the Mass for Sundays, “…you came to the aid of mortal beings with your divinity and even fashioned for us a remedy out of mortality itself, that the cause of our downfall might become the means of our salvation” (© ICEL).
Our greatest weakness is now transformed into our greatest strength by the life, death and resurrection of Christ, and the sending of the Spirit.
Celebration
We shall be celebrating all that in a few weeks, but for now, we can remind ourselves that Christ is with us here. He meets us in the people, the places the thoughts, and the moments of insight that we have each and every day.
We don’t need to look too far. We don’t need to wait until Lent to make spiritual gains, nor on Easter before we can rejoice.
Prayer Suggestion
This is a good time to thank God for our progress. Most of us tend to worry about the things that we haven’t managed yet, the list of ‘things to do.’
We have all made progress of some sort. As we take stock of our lives, it’s best to do so from the perspective of how far the grace of God has already brought us.
We received a very thoughtful Christmas poem which relates equally to Lent, Easter or any other time for that matter. Here it is:
Christmas
is a feast without any reservations, like a child’s heart …
The profundity, breadth & inconceivability of our being
will quietly prevail, like the night, bringing the distant future close
without diminishing it…
IF, in the peace of gentle reserve, of submissiveness,
in the silent holy night of your own heart,
you let the multitude & tumult of things, people & worries recede,
which would otherwise obscure your vision of infinity;
IF, only for a short time,
you extinguish earthly lights which otherwise would obscure the lights of heaven;
IF, in that silent night of the…