Lent Begins and Making Sense of “Pathetic” Sacrifices

How’s your Lent going?  Lent is a funny thing.  On Fat Tuesday, I was craving absolutely nothing — but come Midnight, Ash Wednesday, suddenly I was craving everything.  Why is that?

I even found myself rationalizing, “Well, it’s 12:02, does Ash Wednesday begin now, or when I get up?”  Really, those were thoughts going through my head.  We humans can be so weak.

Recently, a friend posted a meme on Facebook.  It showed 5 images of various sufferings:  the men in orange before they were beheaded by Al-Queda, starving children in Africa, dead bodies after a genocide, a poor man eaten away by starvation and poor little Asian kids with cleft pallets.

These images were awful enough to imagine, but then it had the following words in bold:  “1st World Lent:  The rest of the church militant is so jazzed up about the grace you’re bringin’ by making your bed every day and remembering to smile”.

My first response was, “Ouch”.  It smarts a little, doesn’t it?

Giving up coffee or chocolate, getting up at the crack of dawn to pray, quitting pornography or some other vice, or whatever it is you’ve decided to give up — it doesn’t really add up to a whole lot compared to the human sufferings that were contained within those pictures on that meme.

The more I thought about that picture, though, the more it began to bother me.  It bothered me for a few reasons.  First of all, just because you are poor — it doesn’t necessarily mean you are holy.  The poor are tempted to envy, hatred, selfishness, and bitterness, just like the rich.

Granted, the poor person who offers his poverty to God can become very holy and I have no doubt many a poor person will end up some of the greatest saints in heaven — but just being poor doesn’t guarantee any of that.  You are as likely to be corrupted by that situation as you are to become holy by it.

I am not discounting the cruel sufferings of war and poverty — they are great, indeed — but what I’m trying to say is that there are other kinds of sufferings that can bring people to their knees as well.

Mother Teresa knew a thing or two about poverty, and she said the spiritual poverty of the western world was far worse than the material poverty of the slums of India.

Yes, most people in the west will not die of starvation, but that doesn’t discount the sufferings that are going on around us.  Just because you have a full belly and some money doesn’t mean you are free of suffering.

In fact, Mother Teresa spoke about the poverty of loneliness as one of the greatest poverties.  She found it in an abundance in the western world.

She spoke of children unloved by their parents, elderly parents being institutionalized by their children, but never visited, men dying of AIDS, completely alone in their hospital rooms.  People being shot in the streets and violence in the homes.

She spoke of sadness, depression, loss of faith and hope and charity in the West.  We have all those things in the West, and I dare say, these can be great sufferings — albeit very different from the sufferings of the third world.

And we need to do something to alleviate the sufferings of those in poverty, who lack opportunity for work and education in other countries.  We have a responsibility to do what we can.

We will have to face Jesus one day and make an account of our efforts to clothe and feed and educate the poor.

But, pardon me, whomever made that little meme on “1st World Lenters”, it isn’t fair to discount the loss and suffering of the people of the western world, just because they aren’t living in a war zone or absolute poverty.

Please don’t discount the sadness, depression, sickness and addictions rampant in the West.  These sufferings may not be as evident as the poverty of a child living in the slums of India, but they are very real for the one suffering them.

We may not have slums like Calcutta, but their are wastelands of people in our country who have never heard a kind word or felt a loving touch in all of their lives.

And please don’t discount the good that smiling at somebody or a simple act of charity can do.  Please don’t attack those little efforts at making a dent in the evils of this world.

I imagine the creator of that meme meant well.  It definitely made me think twice about what I was offering for Lent — but the creator of that meme has lost sight of the purpose of Lent.

We don’t give up things to prove ourselves and our toughness, and we don’t take on mortifications and sufferings to justify ourselves, either.

The truth is, nothing we could do could ever make up for our sins or right every wrong in the world.  Nothing.  Lent isn’t about saving ourselves from our sins, because no amount of suffering or sacrifice we take on could ever be enough to save us.

Lent is about recognizing the One who can save us from our sins, the only One who can rescue us from Hell.  It is about finding little ways to thank Him for all He went through on that Good Friday, two millennia ago, and to let Him know that we love Him for it.

As a mother, I can appreciate how small things done in love can be big things.  When my child walks over with a little picture or a snack that they made just for me — it just melts my heart.

Objectively speaking, that drawing is probably not very good and that snack barely edible, but darn it, my heart melts because it was given in love.  My child thought about me when they were making that little picture or little snack, and that loving intention is what touches my heart.

We are that little child, and God is our Father.  Lent is about showing Him we love Him with our pathetic little acts of love — some things given up for Him and some things done for Him.  And not just for Him, but for the people around us.

I may not be able to comfort every sad child in the world, but I can certainly love my own children and teach then to do the same.  I may not be able to feed every hungry belly in the world, but I certainly can feed a few.  I may not be able to right every wrong in the world, but I certainly can right a few wrongs this Lent.

Giving up things for Lent takes faith — faith to believe it makes any difference in this world.  It’s about believing that the God of the Universe could take our pathetic little sacrifices and do something amazing with them.

He can change simple bread to the Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Christ — so what can He do with your little sacrifices and mine offered to Him this Lent?

Don’t believe the lies of the Devil who tells you your sacrifices don’t add up to anything.

Just remember Mr. Miagi and Danielson, the Karate Kid.  Danielson didn’t understand what all those little movements of the “wax on, wax off” and staining that fence could do — but while he was distracted by being faithful to those little actions, Mr. Miagi was making him a kick-butt warrior.

And just maybe, God is wanting to do the same thing for you and for me this Lent.  Maybe, if we only stay faithful to our meager little Lenten resolutions and believe that they can change us and the world around us, just maybe they’ll do just that.

Let’s just keep moving forward and wait to see what the God of the Universe might be doing in you and in me this Lent.

Godspeed, 1st World Lenten People!  You can do this.

Sharing over at Kelly’s