The Presentation of Christ in the Temple, 2010
Dearly Beloved,
The Christian year hangs on three principal feasts: Christmas (Advent, Christmas, Epiphany); Easter (Lent, Holy Week, Easter, Ascension); and, Pentecost (the coming of the Holy Spirit leading to the long green season of growth). Today, Candlemas, ends the Christmas cycle, and now we begin to prepare for Lent. I am eagerly anticipating it and expect that together we will be enriched by this marvelous opportunity for renewal and growth.
Ash Wednesday
Ash Wednesday falls on February 17. We will have two masses: a low mass at 12:10 noon and a high mass at 7:00 p.m. Ashes will be imposed at both. This begins our season of repentance. Repenting, that is literally “returning to God” or “changing our minds,” is the first step toward forgiveness and makes a space in our souls for our Risen Lord.
Sundays in Lent
Often we think of Lent as time of unpleasantness and sorrow – grim and colorless. It is difficult to examine ourselves honestly and to acknowledge where we’ve fallen short. But Lent, this season of turning back to God, can also be a season of gratitude, a time to celebrate what God has done for us, and is doing for us. We can recognize how deeply God loves us, longs for us, desires us. Awakening to God’s acceptance and love for us is life changing.
This Lent our Sunday mass readings will include the parable popularly known as “The Prodigal Son,” but more aptly called “The Father with Two Sons” or “The Two Lost Sons” or even “The Prodigal God.” It’s about our heavenly Father who is always running out to welcome us, who wants relationship with us more than anything else. We receive his embrace not on account of our efforts or goodness, but on account of his love for us – every one of us.
Our parish family is going to reflect on this theme on most Sundays. Our Lent reading will be Timothy Keller’s The Prodigal God, a brief book now on sale at our bookstall as well as most bookstores and online sites. I urge you to get a copy and read it. I expect that this will be an enjoyable, profound, even transforming experience.
The parable expresses the heart of our faith, the nature of our God. It declares the core good news of Christianity, and studying it can help to free us from Churchianity (all the barriers and petty rules we place between ourselves and God’s grace). We are going to begin the series with a half-hour DVD presentation at coffee hour on Sunday, February 14, the Last Sunday of Epiphany.
Bishop’s Visitation
I am delighted that on Sunday, February 28, Lent 2, we will welcome our Bishop, the Bishop of Washington, the Rt. Rev. John Chane. We will have a Pontifical High Mass with the bishop celebrating and preaching. His visitation is an important moment in the life of our community, and I urge you to come worship with him and to greet him at coffee hour.
Bishop Chane has announced his intention to retire in the second half of 2011. So I regret that this may be our last visitation by him. He has been encouraging and enthusiastic about our ministry and a model of graciousness. During this transition, I ask that you keep him and the Diocese in your prayers.
Wednesday Evenings in Lent
In Lent we also offer a special program on Wednesday evenings for worship, fellowship, and learning. Mass begins at 6:30, and then we’ll meet in the undercroft for a potluck dinner and conversation. Everyone is invited to bring something “Lenten” (i.e., please no meat and no sweets) to share with others. If you can’t bring anything, please don’t let that stop you from participating.
We will study and discuss the Book of Common Prayer (1979). It may be that we should have it in all of our pews. We will look at its contents, explore various ways to use it, and consider the ways we use it now. We will examine its various provisions for celebration of the mass, comparing its forms to the order of our high mass and to what the 1928 Prayer Book provided. Liturgy is dynamic, constantly evolving, and we’ll consider the principles behind liturgical development and ponder what core elements of our liturgical tradition are especially meaningful to us.
Lenten Disciplines
As I alluded to above, many of us take on Lenten devotions such as avoiding meat and sweets, and even more spiritually beneficial acts like reducing screen time and television. The season also invites us to take on new devotions and renew old ones. Lent can be more about “taking on” rather than “giving up” things – stretching ourselves in new, positive, constructive ways instead of just self-denial.
I pray that our motivation in being more intentional and mindful of our spiritual life, returning to God, is not from feelings of shame, guilt, fear, or sorrow, but rather from gratitude for our experience of God’s acceptance and love. I suspect that many people associate Lent with hefty doses of self-criticism, but God is prodigal with grace. Being aware of his grace and care, the heart of the gospel, begins with thankfulness.
Enclosed with [the copy of this letter you received at home in the mail was] an envelope for you to make a special Lenten thank offering. I invite you to join me in giving in appreciation for our experience of God’s embrace here in this parish. For the message of Lent is not “you’re a nasty sinner, and you’d better get your act together.” Rather, it’s “God reaches out in love for you, and in gratitude I want to be open to him and thankful for his warmth and care of me.”
With prayers for our renewal together in Lent and gratitude for your friendship and ministry here, yours sincerely,
The Rev. Lane Davenport
www.asa-dc.org
202.347.8161
