Lent is an opportunity for renewal as a congregation and as individuals.

We are in cycle “A” of the lectionary this year. The Lenten readings for cycle “A” were chosen as a series of texts for people preparing for baptism at Easter. We generally baptize infants, but in churches with a significant number of adults preparing for baptism, it is recommended that the cycle “A” readings be used regardless of the actual cycle we are in, so powerful are the images of these readings.

On the five Sundays of Lent we meet: Jesus, hungry and tempted in the desert; Nicodemus with his questions about rebirth; a thirsty Samaritan woman at the well; a man born blind who can now see; and Lazarus, a dead man unbound and raised from the dead. These are among the richest images in the Gospels. During our weekly Wednesday Lenten prayers, we will focus more deeply on these passages and what they signify for the Christian who is hungry for knowledge and truth.

When I was in seminary in the 1970s, I got to know Sr. Mary Aidan Curran, a Sister of Divine Providence and a retired school principal. Sr. Mary Aidan worked the switchboard at the seminary. She was a character! Born in Ireland, she came to America in the early 1920s to teach in the Catholic schools in Kentucky, because the Congregation of Divine Providence, based in Alsace-Lorraine, did not have enough English-speaking nuns in the U.S. after many of them emigrated here to flee World War I.

In her eighties, Sr. Mary Aidan was diagnosed with Macular Degeneration, a disease of the eye that often leads to total blindness over time. She was told that, given her age and the limited treatments available (this was 30 years ago), she would likely lose her sight in five years. When many people would have despaired, Sr. Mary Aidan made a life-changing decision. She decided that she would use her remaining years of eyesight to teach reading to adults in Appalachia. She came OUT of retirement at 82 and taught reading until her death at age 90! This has always stood out in my experience as an example of rebirth, of finding something extraordinary despite the frailty of our mortality.

What will our Lenten discipline yield? Despite our human frailty and sinfulness, where do we find meaning? How can we use Lent as a time to see how we are raised up and reborn in Christ? It all starts with acknowledging our hunger, our brokenness. Then we attend to the Word of God and we apply it to our lives. Repentant sinners, we are reborn as children of God in Christ. This is an amazing gift. Why not share it?

Join me and the Christian Church as together we use this Lenten time to reflect, to be hungry for truth, and to celebrate and proclaim the unbounded grace that lives in God’s love.



Pr. William Barter