Diocese of New Jersey | Bishop Councell

The road map for our Lenten pilgrimage includes an invitation to listen for the voice of God and observe this holy season through the “official channels” (reading and meditating on the Scriptures, receiving the Sacrament of Holy Eucharist, and prayer, fasting and self-denial). All of these are good for the soul, to be sure.

But the invitation to the observance of a holy Lent (in the Liturgy for Ash Wednesday) actually begins with the direction to practice “self-examination and repentance.” Here we are urged to answer God’s call to holiness through the “unofficial channels” of our own lives.

Frederick Buechner, in his book Listening to Your Life, asks a series of questions that help one to reflect on our lives; on where we have come from and where we are going. They seem to me to be well designed for Lenten reflection. I encourage you to take time this Lent to reflect on these questions:

When you look at your face in the mirror, what do you see in it that you most like and what do you see in it that you most deplore?

If you had only one last message to leave to the handful of people who are most important to you, what would it be, in twenty-five words or less?

Of all the things you have done in your life, which is the one you would most like to undo? Which is the one that makes you happiest to remember?

Is there any person in the world, or any cause, that if circumstances called for it, you would be willing to die for?

If this were the last day of your life, what would you do with it?

Frederick Buechner goes on to say:

To hear yourself try to answer questions like these is to begin to hear something not only of who you are, but of both what you are becoming and what you are failing to become. It can be a pretty depressing business, all in all, but if sack cloth and ashes are at the start of it, something like Easter may be at the end.

From ashes to Easter, indeed.

+GEC

Day 10 of Lent: Saturday, 7 March 2009

Lord, grant us passion and purpose.

The cornerstone of my spiritual life is the recitation of Daily Morning Prayer. It is a discipline that, like many clergy, I adopted while in seminary. I have observed it — imperfectly, but more or less consistently — for over 35 years. Several of my colleagues on the diocesan staff and I pray Morning Prayer together in my office each weekday at 9 am. In addition to the lectionary readings, the canticles and prayers for the day, the service includes intercessions for the Anglican Communion, for our Companion Diocese of Central Ecuador and for the churches, clergy, and people of New Jersey.

Sometimes and for some stretches our Lord really speaks to me through the Daily Office. At other times the connection is not so strong. God, I believe, is still speaking. But I am hard of hearing, easily distracted, preoccupied, hard-hearted and/or just afraid. If I am to be really honest, sometimes I have even experienced boredom in my prayers.

One thing I pray for is to have a genuine, vibrant, and faithful life of prayer so that I may follow Jesus Christ, bear witness to him with all that I am and all that I have and lead a Diocese and Church of passion and purpose.

At our best, we are a Church of passion and purpose. At our worst we show forth neither one. We need both, of course. We see plenty of passion around us, but to no apparent purpose; or to purposes that are not worthy of the Gospel. But in the Church we see much that is purposeful (or dutiful, at least), but that lacks the passion that makes the Church’s mission lively and engaging.

Our Right Onward vision for the Diocese of New Jersey includes the initiative to focus on spiritual renewal and to “see people of all ages being transformed by the grace of Jesus Christ into His disciples. . .”

How will you and I be transformed by grace in this season of Lent? If for no other reason than this is a year that is asking each of us and all churches to make many difficult financial and other decisions, we need to seek the transforming grace of our Lord Jesus Christ through prayer and other avenues of personal spiritual renewal.

I believe that, among the blessings that come to us through the discipline of daily reading of Scriptures and offering of prayer, along with times of silence and reflection, are that we are primed for passion and reminded of our purpose. We cannot ask our Church to be renewed without seeking personal renewal.

In the New Testament lesson for this morning, we read that, “In the days of his flesh, Jesus offered up prayers and supplications, with loud cries and tears. . .” (Hebrews 5:7).

As he was purposeful and passionate in his prayers, his living and dying, so may we be graced with those gifts, for the sake of our souls and for the renewal of the Church that we love. No plans or strategies or hopes or visions will bear fruit unless we are drawn into deeper and more intimate union with our Lord.

Lord, may our purpose be in accordance with your will and never be empty of passion; and may our passion always be in the service of your purpose. And may our observance of this holy season please you, give glory to your name and make New Jersey new. Amen.

Day 9 of Lent: Friday, 6 March 2009

Some years ago in a large city in the far West, rumors spread that a certain Catholic woman was having visions of Jesus. The reports reached the archbishop. He decided to check her out. There is always a fine line between the authentic mystic and the lunatic fringe.

“Is it true, ma’am, that you have visions of Jesus?” asked the cleric.

“Yes,” the woman replied simply.

“Well, the next time you have a vision, I want you to ask Jesus to tell you the sins that I confessed in my last confession.”

The woman was stunned. “Did I hear you right, bishop? You actually want me to ask Jesus to tell me the sins of your past?”

“Exactly. Please call me if anything happens.”

Ten days later the woman notified her spiritual leader of a recent apparition. “Please come,” she said.

Within the hour the archbishop arrived. He trusted eye-to-eye contact. “You just told me on the telephone that you actually had a vision of Jesus. Did you do what I asked?”

“Yes, bishop. I asked Jesus to tell me the sins you confessed in your last confession.”

The bishop leaned forward with anticipation. His eyes narrowed. “What did Jesus say?”

She took his hand and gazed deep into is eyes. “Bishop,” she said, “these are his exact words: ‘I CAN’T REMEMBER.’”

Told by Brennan Manning in The Ragamuffin Gospel.

Grant, most merciful Lord, to your faithful people pardon and peace, that they may be cleansed from all their sins, and serve you with a quiet mind; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Day 8 of Lent: Thursday, 5 March 2009

This is my comfort in my trouble, that your promise gives me life. Psalm 119:50

In times of trouble I pay God much more attention than I do when things are well. I am not proud of that, but it’s true. I’ve jumped into many foxholes in my life and I’ve filled up each one with my prayers. In fact, foxholes have proven, over and over again, to be good for my soul’s health. I would say that the more I’ve experienced my dependency upon God for all things, the more I’ve grown in my relationship with God. I’m convinced that that is so because in hard times I actually pay attention to my life — to all of life and not just the “spiritual” parts — with the hope and expectation that God does speak to us and God does act in our lives today.

If it is true, as M. Scott Peck once wrote, that love is giving someone your full attention, then I really seem to love God in the rough stretches of my life. And, yes, I notice that the Bible comes alive and every passage seems to speak volumes to me. My prayers are more genuine and more fervent. I experience deeper comfort, consolation and real peace. Even the questions that arise in a crisis — “For what purpose is this happening?” “What is God teaching me through this experience?” “How shall I be faithful in these circumstances?” — are the means of drawing closer to God.

Harvard Psychiatrist Robert Coles once interviewed a factory worker who shared this reflection about paying attention to God and to one’s life in a time of crisis.

Twice, just twice, have I stopped and thought to myself, “Who are you, mister, and what are you doing here, and what should you be doing besides what you’ve been told by your boss and your neighbors and everyone else?” It was after my father died. It was when my little boy fell sick and he had leukemia, they thought. And for a month we stared death in the face with him. And for a month I wasn’t the same person, the same person I usually am. They decided he didn’t have leukemia and he’d be all right — and I told my wife that I had never lived like that before — all the wondering about the world, all the questions I asked. I don’t mean my questions were so good, and I know everyone asks questions sometimes. But I asked them — I asked them with my whole heart.

Lent is a season of paying attention to God through all of the traditional means and channels: prayer, fasting, self-denial; reading and meditating on the Scripture; through the Holy Eucharist and the rite of Reconciliation. But God also speaks to us through our heart’s deep questions in times of crisis. Hard times are not to be sought for their own sake, as an end in themselves. But there is as much grace (or more) in them as there is in the smooth and easy passages of our lives.

The promises of God are sure. We learn that best when we are in a blessable posture; i.e., a posture of dependence upon our God. As the poet and priest John Donne prayed, “Lord, suffer us never to think that we can stand on our own and not need thee.” Amen.

Day 7 of Lent: Wednesday, 4 March 2009

Ten years ago last January I was diagnosed with cancer of the colon. I underwent surgery and six months of chemotherapy. Ever since then I have had regular checkups and all the usual tests. So far as I know, I am cancer free.

This past weekend Chris died. She was diagnosed two years after I was, but with a much more serious cancer than my own. She underwent much more aggressive treatments with much more powerful drugs, for the past eight years. Chris was a faithful, committed and active member of the parish I served before coming to New Jersey. She was the wife of John and mother of their three children, all in their teens and twenties.

As Chris was in the final hours of her life, I wrote to her husband, John:

I count myself blessed to be among the many, many people who have had the privilege to know and to work with Chris. I cherish all of the ways she was such a brilliant, competent, gracious, kind and effective partner in ministry. . . I have rarely seen anyone with her capacities for both hard work and great fun. It was a special gift to me personally to listen to her and to pray with her when she became ill. I am so glad that we were able to keep in touch, from time to time, over these past six years (almost). It was good to hear good news, of course, whenever that was the case. But it was also a gift of God to witness her courage in the face of every setback. She was honest about her fears, but her faith in God’s love was stronger than any fear. I know that she has known what St. Paul meant when he wrote about “the peace that surpasses understanding” (Philippians 4:7). I pray that she is surrounded by that peace now.

This is all very, very tough. It raises our deepest questions and plunges us into our deepest grief. We need not pretend otherwise. Our own Book of Common Prayer notes that our hope in the resurrection and our Easter joy do not make human grief unchristian (page 507), We are made fully human and we will have the full human range of feelings and reactions in the midst of these circumstances: sorrow, grief, anger, confusion, numbness, depression and more.

But we Christians are people of hope and it’s not for this life only that we hope. Easter points us to a longer horizon and a brighter dawn. For all the incredible goodness of our lives and loves, we all know that we all, someday, have to let all of that goodness and everyone and everything go. I hate this. When I think of Chris and others I have had to let go of — the dearest and the best — I often feel that God has a lot of explaining to do. But then I recall that Jesus let go of everything and everyone, too, when he died on the Cross. That was part of his mission. The prospect of it tore him up and troubled his soul (John 12:27). But he pointed to the fullness of his mission when he promised, “I go to prepare a place for you” (John 14:2-3). Whenever any of us leaves, we go to a place that Jesus has prepared for us and where He may be found.

So, my dear brother, I’m thinking of you and John, Kate, and Mike and praying that you will be surrounded by love and strengthened by faith and upheld in hope. We have the greatest hope the world has ever known: the hope that we will all be with Jesus and hope that we will all be together in that place where there is no death and there are no tears, but only life. Life is the final word. In the end, Jesus wins and we have a victory in Him that no one and nothing can ever take away.

Here is the final question and answer in our Catechism:

What, then, is our assurance as Christians?

Our assurance as Christians is that nothing, not even death, shall separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. Amen.

I remember that I am dust and to dust I shall return. It is not given to me to know why I am still here and so many others have gone before me. But even as I remember the dust, I remember the glory for which we were made. I remember that, as long as we are here, we have a song to sing: “All we go down to the dust; yet even at the grave we make our song: Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia” (The Book of Common Prayer, page 499).

Lent is our life’s journey, from ashes to Easter.

+GEC

Earlier blogs
Ash Wednesday through Day 6 of Lent

Later blogs
Day 12 through Day 17 of Lent