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Dear Families: A Lenten Story,
“I feel sorry for the whole human race,” she said, a woman who had started up some small talk in our doctor’s waiting room on Ash Wednesday. “Yeah,” I replied not so eloquently, “there’s sure a lot of bad things going on.” She had heard me check in as “Brother,” and that must have piqued her curiosity. “Malden Catholic?” she said, noting my MC jacket. I explained I was a Xaverian Brother teaching at MC, and she said, “Oh, I went to a Catholic boarding school in Pennsylvania. Blue nuns ran it.” She was Iranian. Her father had sent her to the United States for an education, and she had shuffled among boarding schools for much of her youth. The brief reference to “sorrow for the whole human race” struck me as a particularly “Lenten” theme, though probably made with no thought of Lent at all in mind.
Earlier in the day I had discussed Lent and Ash Wednesday with my Theology classes. We know Lent as a penitential season, inviting us to assess our relationship with God, deepening our prayer life, helping those in need (almsgiving), and demonstrating less involvement with self – mortifying ourselves – through practices like fasting or “giving something up.” In class we discussed the symbolic richness in wearing ashes: that it has Biblical roots among ancient Hebrews and other cultures; that people would sit in dust or ashes, or sprinkle ashes over themselves as ways of expressing grief, repentance and humiliation.
In class we also viewed a short Father Mike Schmidt video about Ash Wednesday. He put an interesting spin on “repentance.” Sometimes, unless we are outrageously great sinners, we may not feel that we have much to be sorry about! “What do I have to repent of?!” What we might consider, though, is that – made in God’s image – we are meant to be “incredible”! Sometimes we forget how great we can be, ought to be. Some of you may have been in the Doherty Gymnasium a few weeks ago when Boys Basketball took down #1-ranked Catholic Memorial in a super-exciting game before a packed house. The Lancerdome was rocking! One could tell from the post-game celebration on the floor that the players felt absolutely incredible. I imagine the next time the team drags through a practice or sleeps through a game, coaches will – maybe not so gently! – remind players of their promise, of how great they could be. And players could reference that incredible feeling they once generated in themselves to know the truth of the matter.
Ashes, and the “repentance” they call for, remind us to close the gap between how incredible we could be as children of God and how we sometimes find ourselves. A world-view that inspires the thought of a general malaise, the idea that “I feel sorry for the whole human race,” suggests that on a grand scale, something’s not right. We’re not the way we can be and ought to be, and we know it. The same may apply personally. We are not without direction, though. Ashes point us toward how we should be. In the shape of a cross, branding our foreheads as “claimed for God,” ashes direct us to Jesus, whose love might inspire us to be our best selves. May each of us in our Malden Catholic family be granted Lenten inspiration!
Sincerely,
Br. Thomas Puccio C.F.X., Ed.D., H'18
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