Fr Jarek Kurek OSB
It struck me, at the outset of this New Year 2024, how eagerly people got down to make their New Year’s resolutions. Something embedded deep down seeking change, seeking renewal, causing a resolution to form in heart and mind.
Now Lent has begun, a new season indeed, a most important time in our Christian life. So, what change are we seeking, what renewal, and what resolution are we making in our hearts and minds?
It has been, I think, not difficult to grasp this newness and renewal listening to the gospel today. Jesus prompts his listeners to repentance, to conversion, to perform a change in their hearts and minds.
The Greek word for this change is metanoia – it is to leave behind our old ways of being and thinking and embrace a new existence, which Jesus continuously points us towards in his teaching.
What does it actually mean? What are we to do? How are we to be?
I think a reflection on the following words of Jesus should help us a lot: ‘If anyone wants to become my follower, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me’.
Now, in our modern minds, the cross doesn’t strike any positive notes! But, if we looked at the ancient tradition of the church, also in Ireland, we will find a different idea, and, I think, quite inspiring. So what do the medieval monks say about taking up the cross? They suggest that, yes, there is a necessity to abstain from food and reject vices, but taking up Jesus’s cross leads to following Jesus in his good thoughts; this was their understanding of the metanoia, our conversion.
Let me divide this path of conversion into three parts – body, mind and Jesus. First, there is the cross of our body, abstaining from food and so on, fast we all know.
What comes next is the reality, I believe, less known to us… the cross of our mind. Now what could that ‘mental cross’ be? Let me give you at least two aspects of it. The first of this mental cross is a fast of the mind, that is fasting in our thoughts from gossip, envy, lust after
vengeance etc. This is what the tradition regarded as the true and sanctifying fast, the fast which can bring a profound transformation to our spiritual life. But there is another side of this mental cross that we are supposed to carry, that is compassion. Compassion for all people and all creatures. It is our Christian task to be with others, to be for them, to share their infirmities, to help them in sickness, both of body and mind. But there is a caveat: we are guided by the wise monks of the past – with compassion for the person but with opposition to their vices. Since, they say, if ‘we rashly pardon faults we may appear to be no longer sharing in their sufferings through charity, but be yielding through indifference’. Truly food for thought…
Lastly, the final step in this path of conversion is following Jesus in our ‘good thoughts’. The preceding steps should transform the working of our bodies and minds, and so prepare us for a new approach to our spiritual life. With the old, bad habits and thoughts gone, we are ready to make our Lenten preparations different, new indeed.
Because, if we catch the novelty of how to take up the cross, the cross of our bodies and minds, then instead of sorrow, or perhaps some flatness in our spiritual life, we will be able to truly remain spiritually alive, in Christ.
Through the days of this Lent try to make an attempt to renew your Christian life, make it your determined resolution and soon you will benefit from this blessed effort.
And finally using the words of St Benedict let me say this to you ‘now with the joy of spiritual desire wait for Holy Easter’.