A Chapter Conference for the Friday of the First Week of Lent

+ Tribulationes cordis mei dilatatae sunt: de necessitatibus meis eripe me, Domine. Vide humilitatem meam, et laborem meum: et dimitte omnia peccata mea.  (The troubles of my heart are multiplied: deliver me from my distress, O Lord. See my abjection and my hardships; and forgive me all my sins.)

Thus we shall sing in this Sunday’s Gradual. Appositely, perhaps, coming as it does after St Paul’s rather ‘direct’ Epistle (1 Thess. 4:1-7) in which he tells us very bluntly how we are to live:

“For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you should abstain from fornication, that every one of you should know how to possess his body in sanctification and honour; not in the passion of lust, like the Gentiles that know not God: and that no man overreach nor circumvent his brother in business: because the Lord is the Avenger of all these things, as we have told you before and have all testified. For God hath not called us unto uncleanness, but unto sanctification.”

Set against the very high benchmark of Christian teaching, who amongst us does not need to pray: Vide humilitatem meam, et laborem meum: et dimitte omnia peccata mea. It is certainly a prayer that rightly takes its place in our hearts and on our lips in Lent.

And yet the Church’s Sacred Liturgy follows this Gradual with a Tract which immediately sings:  Confitemini Domino, quoniam bonus: quoniam in saeculum misericordia eius (Praise the Lord for he is good: for His mercy endureth forever), and which continues in what can only be described as a confident if not upbeat assertion of God’s blessing and mercy.

A good tonic, certainly, in the wake of St Paul’s sober medicine and straight talking. For whilst St Paul is right, and whilst our failures to live according to the benchmark of Christian doctrine do weigh us down, it is good—indeed it is necessary, and it is just—that we sing of God’s mercy which endures and that we praise Him for this.

​But this Tract also serves as the prelude for this Sunday’s Gospel passage, which is, of course, that of the Transfiguration of the Lord. (Mt 17:1-9)

It is perhaps somewhat odd that the Church gives us this Gospel passage on the Second Sunday of Lent. It has little to do with prayer, fasting and penance for sin as have the vast majority of the Lenten liturgical texts (at least in the usus antiquior). And yet on Sunday, our Holy Mother, the Church, will take us, with all our troubles and distress and abjection and hardships, up a high mountain to behold His Transfigured Presence. We shall hear the voice out of the cloud, saying: “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased: listen to Him.” And perhaps, in the light of our own sins and of our continual struggle or seeming inability to rise above them, we too shall fall to the ground, overcome with fear in the face of a radiant goodness that is totally other, that is utterly beyond us.

But the Church has not taken us up this mountain to confound our misery or to drive us to despair. Rather, as ever, she has led us to a mountain top so as to hear the voice of the Lord. “Arise,” He says, “Do not be afraid.”

My brothers, in the personal conversion which the Gospel demands of each of us, and upon which we rightly focus with greater intensity in this beautiful season of Lent, there is no room for fear. There is no place for despair. Yes, our sins, past and present, burden us and weigh us down. They distress us. And yes, sometimes even our best efforts to confront them seemingly come to nothing. I say “seemingly” because every effort, howsoever small or apparently futile, to avoid sin or occasions of sin is an act of love and worship of Almighty God which shall not go unrewarded. The Lord is good: His mercy endures forever. It is He who says to us “Arise. Do not be afraid.”

And so, ten days into Lent, we must not be afraid. Even if our Lenten resolutions have already suffered damage or our application of them seems to have amounted to nothing, we must arise without fear and, with the Lord at our side, come down from the high mountain and continue to walk with Him knowing that the radiant power and goodness we have been shown is our strength and our victory even amidst the burdens we bear, provided we remain with Him and with His Church and persevere faithfully in her teaching.
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If we do this we can sing in Sunday’s Offertory antiphon: Meditabor in mandatis tuis, quae dilexi valde: et levabo manus meas ad mandata tua, quae dilexi. (I will meditate on Thy commandments, which I have loved exceedingly: and I will lift up my hands to Thy commandments which I have loved.) And in so doing we shall both render that worship to Almighty God which is His due and open our hearts and souls to receive the graces we need faithfully to persevere in His love. +