On the evening of Shrove Tuesday I prepared the Chapel for Ash Wednesday and the beginning of the season of Lent – removing the flowers; changing the altar cover from green to purple; swapping the ambo fall from Ordinary Time to Lent; and then preparing the ashes ready for distribution the next morning. And I left the building to continue on my way…
The next morning was when the contrast hit me, like never before – Lent had arrived. As soon as I entered the Chapel I was struck by the starkness of the décor, by the lack of vibrant colour from flowers, by the silence and most of all by the emptiness of the place. I realised Lent had truly begun. On entering the Chapel this morning, I became aware of the desert experience – the barrenness of the landscape around me. As I sat to reflect I thought of Jesus being led by the Spirit into the desert for forty days. Imagine forty days of stark, barren landscape! I wondered is Lent an endurance test or a season to be embraced – to take in the silence, to wait patiently amid the barren landscape to await life to unfold again. Lent is a time to reflect on what I really want to see and be in the world today – what do I have to offer and what does the world need from me? Big questions – but I have forty days to contemplate some small offering as an answer to them. And at the end of the forty days, the colour will return, the alleluias will be sung, the Gloria will ring out once more – the question is will I have made some change in my life, in my vision of the world and the future having embraced the penance, the fasting and the prayer of Lent?
Karen OSU