2007 1st Sunday of Lent. C. February

To many in the modern world, Lent, with its traditional emphasis on things like fasting and self-denial, seems like a relic from a bygone age. And it certainly isn’t in tune with a consumer-driven culture which encourages the instant gratification of every desire. But what I am inviting you to recognize this week is that, far from belonging to the past, Lent is more relevant today than it has ever been and that the prayer, fasting and alsmgiving which lie at its ancient core take us to the heart of the challenges facing our society at this moment in history.

That our society today needs the grace of conversion and renewal is surely beyond doubt. Having said that, I don’t want to go down the road, so seductive for religious, church-going people, of suggesting that the world is in a terrible state. This kind of thinking is simply not compatible with faith in the providence of God at work in history, something I have said many times here over the years. There are wonderful things going on in the world and the signs are everywhere for those who have eyes to see. But although that is true, there is also a deep need for repentance and conversion, the signs of which are there all around us too. Take, for example, the recent report from UNICEF telling us that, when it comes to happiness and self-esteem, our children and young people are bottom of a league table of the world’s twenty one most developed nations, the United States, with all its riches and power, being the other country fighting against relegation along with us. Why is this at a time in history when we have levels of prosperity and affluence never seen before? Add to that the fact that we top almost every other league table that comes out, having the worst record in Europe on drugs, heart disease, teenage pregnancies, alcoholism, suicides and virtually every modern evil you care to mention. Clearly something has gone wrong. There is something rotten in the State of Denmark and it’s the job of men and women of faith to confront this situation head-on and discern what is happening. That is what it means to read the signs of the times, the principal aim of the Second Vatican Council, and the first tool we have at our disposal during Lent is prayer.

And by prayer I don’t mean praying FOR things. I read recently a remark by William Johnston, an Irish Jesuit who has live and worked for years in Japan and who has written some wonderful books on prayer and spirituality which I know some of you have read. Speaking of the challenge facing the Church today, he says: ‘We must give the people mysticism or die.’ And by mysticism he doesn’t mean having extraordinary spiritual experiences. To be a mystic – and we are called to this – is to see beyond the surface into the depth of things. It is to read the signs of the times and understand them. It is to experience a change in ourselves so profound that, for the first time, we begin to see the full truth about ourselves, the world and everything that goes on in it. It is to see the world as God sees it. It is to understand the world as God understands it. That is the kind of vision we need today and it comes through the quiet, reflective, contemplative prayer Lent is calling us to in the midst of a world where there is so much that is superficial, noisy and empty.

Take, for the sake of argument, the role played in our lives by television. In the sixties and seventies, for example, it was used in a deliberate and calculated way by governments all over the Third World as a way of keeping people’s mind off the poverty and injustice they were living in. The theory was simple: fill their lives with endless soap-operas and it will keep them off the streets. And something similar, if not the same, is going on among us. Experts call it ‘dumbing down,’ and we see it everywhere. We see it in the lack of decent documentaries on TV which would encourage us to think. We see it in the way our politicians address us through sound-bites and slick advertising rather than the kind of reasoned argument and discussion I hope we can have with Des Browne next Sunday. We see it in the way our News bulletins are so often dominated by utterly trivial stories about Britney Speirs or some other poor, pathetic casualty of our so-called celebrity culture. We see it in the wall-to-wall rubbish awaiting anyone who flicks through our hundreds of satellite TV channels in the hope of finding something decent to watch. And all of this in a world where there are huge issues at stake, issues upon which we, as men and women of faith, are called. first to reflect and second to shine the light of the Gospel. And it simply cannot be done without the kind of prayer leading to mysticism William Johnston was speaking of.

And then there is fasting. Can there ever have been a moment in history when fasting was more in tune with the situation we find ourselves in? We eat too much. Obesity is now a cause of serious ill health costing the health service millions of pounds. We consume oil and other energy resources at a totally unsustainable rate which is destroying the planet. Binge drinking, doctors tell us, is destroying the liver of many of our young people. We are obsessed with possessing things, the vast majority of which are luxuries or gadgets we don’t need. The notion of waiting for something or saving up for it has almost disappeared as we see the level of private borrowing rising away beyond economically acceptable levels. Is it any wonder we think fasting and self-denial are old-fashioned?

And what can we say about alsmgiving? While we spend millions on the effects of obesity in our children, millions of other children, the same age as them, are dying of hunger and poverty. And it’s happening while we sit in front of our TVs eating crisps and watching Big Brother. The situation, in fact, has gone far beyond almsgiving. What is required now is a massive re-distribution of wealth, sharing on a previously unimagined scale and what politicians like to call ‘a new world order.’ And this can only happen when we, the people of the developed world, put down our knives and forks, switch off our Teles and take seriously what is happening in the world. And that, in essence, is what Lent is inviting us to do. Prayer, fasting and alsmgiving go to the very heart of the matter and there is nothing old-fashioned about them.
In today’s Gospel, Jesus is led by the Spirit into the wilderness to confront the devil and engage him in spiritual combat during a period of forty days. And so we pray for the grace to do that in our own lives during these forty days of Lent. We pray that, through prayer, we will be enabled to go beyond what is superficial in our world, enter deeply into the challenges facing humanity at this time and be able to see more clearly what the response of men and women of faith needs to be……Lord hear us

In our consumer-driven society there are many forms of addiction. Some are addicted to drugs or alcohol, but many others are addicted to things like food, television, shopping, having our own way and many others. And so we pray for the wisdom we need this Lent to recognize our own personal addictions and grow in freedom from them by the mature practice of fasting and self-denial…………………...Lord hear us

Through almsgiving, we are called to reach out to those in need. This is fundamental to the christian life, but has always had special emphasis during Lent. And so we pray for the interior freedom we need to give generously this year to the annual SCIAF campaign. We pray that, like the poor woman in the Gospel who gave all that she had, our giving will go beyond what we have extra and come from what the advertisers have conned us into thinking we need to live on……………..Lord hear us

Constantly subjected to rubbish on TV and in the Press, our minds easily become lazy. And so our capacity to engage with serious issues is diminished, pushing us into watching and reading even more rubbish. And so we ask God for the commitment we need to engage more seriously this Lent with important issues like global warming, the decision about Trident, the forth-coming election here in Scotland, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and many others….....Lord hear us

If the recent report from UNICEF is true and our children and young people are the most unhappy in the developed world. then we have a serious problem. And so we pray for the wisdom we need to understand what lies behind this report. One of the things which emerged was that many families rarely eat together or talk to each other and, if this is true of our own families, we pray for the grace to do something about it during Lent this year…………….Lord hear us

The meeting where we will have an opportunity to enter into debate and discussion with our MP, Des Browne, on the subject of Trident and the government’s imminent decision to replace it, has been postponed for a week. We pray, however, that when it does come, the meeting will be a mature and adult one where we will listen to everyone with respect and be open to truth wherever it comes from. We pray, too, for Des Browne himself who carries a very heavy burden at this time in his capacity as Secretary of State for Defence……………….Lord hear us