1st Sunday of Lent 2015
Robert VerEecke, S.J.
Ice jams and snow banks and hail, oh my (3X)
Whenever I hear Mark’s version of the Temptations, I am tempted to begin
with the mantra: Lions, and tigers and bears, Oh My! I’m refering of course
to the wild beasts that Jesus encounters in the desert.
This year, however, the wild beasts have been the forces of nature. 40 days
and nights of snow and concomitant floods inside houses due to ice jams,
breakdowns of the T, traffic nightmare, roofs collapsing. O Hail!
It might be challenging to imagine a “desert”, this dry and warm place when
we have been inundated with snow, ice and cold. But if you think of it, our
landscape of late has been desolate, disorienting, discombobulating. (And
by the way, it snowed 10 inches in Jerusalem this week and even the desert
was covered with snow. Talk about the world being turned upside down!
Things are just not what they should be!)
Welcome to the first Sunday of Lent and the beginning of a journey that is
always meant to be disorienting. It is a journey where we are meant to get
lost, to lose ourselves, to wander around wondering: where are we going? It
is a bit like the journey through Oz where we seek again to find our way
home and on the way find the why (a brain), the what ( a heart), and the how
(courage). Those of you who remember Fr. Jim Morgan—who was
associate pastor here for many years—may remember his Ash Wednesday
homily, the same year after year, in which Dorothy, the scarecrow, the tin
man and the lion were models for the Christian community journeying on
the yellow brick road, searching for their true selves and confronting all
kinds of obstacles and demons on the way.
If you were here this Ash Wednesday you may have been surprised when
you were asked to turn around and process to the baptismal font to receive
the ashes. We wanted to “re-orient” ourselves, to journey to the waters of
baptism at the beginning of Lent. That is what Lent is about after all. It’s
not a private exercise in self control or self denial. It’s a public witness to
who we are as followers of Jesus, immersed in the mystery of his life, death
and resurrection. It’s why we are here today supporting four people who are
seeking Christ in the Sacraments of Initiation.
But this journey is not a piece of cake—angel food or devil’s food. It is a
journey filled with obstacles, with terrors and testing. It is not a straight path.
It is as twisted and turning as the yellow brick road. It is in fact like our city
in the past weeks, confronting one obstacle after another, wanting all the
snow and ice and cold to disappear, finding our way to “normal”, whatever
that is. And it is no easier in our world, which is plagued by violence and
horrific crimes such as beheadings and burnings alive. The world is a very
scary place these days.
And yet, there is the promise. There is the covenant that God makes with us
in Jesus Christ. There is the proclamation “Turn around, Reorient
yourselves, believe the Good News”. It is what brings Whitney, Erik, Colby
and Jenna to want to find their way to the waters of baptism. And we are
here to help them find their way. No, we are not perfect companions on the
journey. Our faith flags, our confidence collapses, our desolations in the face
of a future of unknowns can get the best of us. But the best of us is the faith
we have in God who is always faithful. The best of us is our relationship
with Jesus who is always with us as our companion on the journey. The best
of us is God’s Holy Spirit who dwells within us leading us, guiding us along
the way.
And then of course there are the angels. It’s not just the wild beasts, there are
the angels who minister to Jesus and who minister to us. This past week, we
were dealing with ice jams and leaks and ceilings collapsing in our house. I
imagine many of you have had the same. I told some of the workmen who
came to our rescue that I would publicly thank them for being the “angels”
who countered the wild beasts of winter. So thanks. And thanks to these four
catechumens, soon to be Elect for choosing to follow Christ.