Lenten Calendar: Another Season, Another Fast

Posted on February 25, 2020 by Jenn Cavanaugh

art by Julie Elfers

I’ve blogged a few of years of Advent reflections, but Lent calls for a different kind of pace and energy that I’m just now trying to summon and articulate for the first time.

Both Advent and Lent are fasts, designated times of preparation that allow us to better celebrate the feasts of Christmas and Easter. Both seasons are quiet, but Advent mirrors the deepening stillness of winter’s approach, where Lent channels the subterranean stirrings of early spring.

Advent is lament, crying out in our need and powerlessness as the darkness deepens around us. Lent is repentance, throwing off every self-imposed impediment so we can walk in freedom and power in the light, The discipline of Advent is to cultivate hope in spite of the darkness around us. The discipline of Lent is to spite the darkness within and share the hope that is also within us.

During Advent we meditate on the wonder of God coming to be human as we are: small and vulnerable. During Lent we follow Jesus in his earthly ministry, striving to become human as he is: whole and restoring others to wholeness.

In Advent we fall to our knees in anticipation of a blessing and receive the gift of a savior. In Lent we rise to our feet to be a blessing and learn to give sacrificially in the model of the Savior.

Advent is dwelling on the promise of Isaiah 9:6; it’s a call to wait on the Lord. Lent is embracing the exhortation of Isaiah 58:6; it’s a call to action.

Each of the 40 days of Lent I will try to post a little something to get us moving. A song, a poem, an article, a study, a wandering exploration, a quote…. We’ll see. I have no overarching plan beyond the grand tradition of the disciples – just praying to be able to keep up as Jesus quickens his pace toward Jerusalem.

Never Miss Another Birthday: Ideas for Pentecost

Posted on April 13, 2015 by Jenn Cavanaugh

“Pentecost Sunday is an end and a beginning. It is the culmination of the season of Easter. It is the day when the church senses the all-pervasive power of Easter as the Spirit is unleashed on Creation.”[1]

During the service people wrote on individual flames where they were hearing the Spirit call and what gifts they had been given to use in their calling. As part of the offering time they brought them forward to be assembled into the mural shown here.

Fire pit on the sidewalk (must be attended)
Remove the outside doors from their hinges (assuming this is safe and reversible)
Make stackable boxes marked “everything we know about God” and give one to everyone entering along with instructions to take it up to the front of the church. Someone there assists people to stack them in the shape of a tower on top of several boxes that are already in place. These are rigged with string so when the account of the tower of Babel is read the strings can be pulled by a couple of people in the front rows to activate a spectacular collapse.
Later in the service people can approach the rubble as Peter’s speech is being read and receive a cross sticker to place on a box (or a small wooden cross to place inside a box or just by itself) to take out with them. Alternatively, distribute the boxes before the sermon and have people add their own words and images of the empty tomb, tongues of fire, etc.
Red rose petals – drop from balcony as people exit or in baskets in the pews, for handling during sermon
Toss red, orange and yellow streamers over the congregation during or after the benediction.
Sparklers to take away.
The church, frankly, needs more parties. Roberto Goizueta reminds us that “Play, recreation, and celebration are the most authentic forms of life precisely because, when we are playing, recreating, or celebrating, we are immersed in, or ‘fused,’ with the action itself, and those other persons with whom we are participating. Thus, we are involved in and enjoying the living itself.”[2] We chartered as a church on Pentecost and we threw ourselves and the neighborhood a block party with games, food and live music. Even if you didn’t charter on that day, it’s still the birthday of the Church, so whoop it up. Maybe you’ll have an annual picnic that day and hire a band or fly kites or do something else beautiful that expresses your identity as a church and that can be enjoyed by all.

Feel free to post additional ideas below!

The worship band worked up a command performance of their favorite covers of the last year for our block party.

[1] Robert E. Webber, Ancient-Future Time: Forming Spirituality through the Christian Year (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 2004), 161-162.

[2] Roberto Goizueta, Caminemos con Jesus: Toward a Hispanic/ Latino Theology of Accompaniment (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1995), p. 94. Qtd. In William A. Dyrness, Poetic Theology: God and the Poetics of Everyday Life (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 2011), 55.

A Fasting Florilegium

Posted on March 30, 2015 by Jenn Cavanaugh

“Consumerism, instead of satisfying needs, constantly creates new ones, often generating excessive activism. Everything seems necessary and urgent and one risks not even finding the time to be alone with oneself for a while. St Augustine’s warning is more timely than ever. “Enter again into yourself.” Yes, we must enter again into ourselves if we want to find ourselves. Not only our spiritual life is at stake but indeed our personal, family and social equilibrium itself. One of the meanings of penitential fasting is to help us recover an interior life. The effort of moderation in food also extends to other things that are not necessary, and this is a great help to the spiritual life. Moderation, recollection and prayer go hand in hand.” – Pope John Paul II http://www.ewtn.com/library/PAPALDOC/JP960310.HTM

“…go back through history and inquire into the ancient origins of fasting. It is not a recent invention; it is an heirloom handed down by our fathers. Everything distinguished by antiquity is venerable. Have respect for the antiquity of fasting. It is as old as humanity itself; it was prescribed in Paradise…. Fasting gives birth to prophets and strengthens the powerful; fasting makes lawgivers wise. Fasting is a good safeguard for the soul, a steadfast companion for the body, a weapon for the valiant, and a gymnasium for athletes.” – Basil “Homily on Fasting” http://www.hsir.org/pdfs/2009/03/04/20090304aStBasilOnFasting%20Folder/20090304aStBasilOnFasting.pdf

“Fasting is a person’s whole-body, natural response to life’s sacred moments… not an instrument designed to get desired results. The focus in the Christian tradition is not ‘if you fast you will get,’ but ‘when this happens, God’s people fast.” – Scot McKnight, Fasting p. ix, xvii

“Each time we feel hunger or resist the temptation to eat and drink we are reminded of why we are not eating or drinking, namely because we want to become people whose entire heart, mind, soul, and strength are devoted to loving God. We can also give our surplus to others who are in need and learn to use the things of this world properly. Should we be attracted to fasting for less worthwhile reasons, such as losing weight for cosmetic reasons, these very thoughts help us recognize the mixed nature of our motives.” – Diogenes Allen, Spiritual Theology p. 83

“We must be careful not to make a formal fasting, or one that in truth “satisfies” us because it makes us feel as though we have all in order. Fasting makes sense if it really affects our security, and also if a benefit to others comes from it, if it helps us to grow in the spirit of the Good Samaritan, who bends down to his brother in need and takes care of him. Fasting involves choosing a sober life, which does not waste, which does not “discard”. Fasting helps us to train the heart to essentiality and sharing. It is a sign of awareness and responsibility in the face of injustices, abuses, especially towards the poor and the little ones, and is a sign of our trust in God and His providence.” – Pope Francis http://en.radiovaticana.va/storico/2014/03/05/pope_francis_celebrates_ash_wednesday_mass/en1-778966

“It is not the uncleanness of meat that I fear, but the uncleanness of an incontinent appetite. I know that permission was granted Noah to eat every kind of flesh that was good for food; that Elijah was fed with flesh; that John, blessed with a wonderful abstinence, was not polluted by the living creatures (that is, the locusts) on which he fed. But I also know that Esau was deceived by his hungering after lentils and that David blamed himself for desiring water, and that our King was tempted not by flesh but by bread. And, thus, the people in the wilderness truly deserved their reproof, not because they desired meat, but because in their desire for food they murmured against the Lord. Set down, then, in the midst of these temptations, I strive daily against my appetite for food and drink. For it is not the kind of appetite I am able to deal with by cutting it off once for all, and thereafter not touching it, as I was able to do with fornication. The bridle of the throat, therefore, must be held in the mean between slackness and tightness.” Augustine, Confessions, XXXI

“…fasting represents an important ascetical practice, a spiritual arm to do battle against every possible disordered attachment to ourselves. Freely chosen detachment from the pleasure of food and other material goods helps the disciple of Christ to control the appetites of nature, weakened by original sin, whose negative effects impact the entire human person. Quite opportunely, an ancient hymn of the Lenten liturgy exhorts: ‘Utamur ergo parcius, / verbis cibis et potibus, / somno, iocis et arctius / perstemus in custodia – Let us use sparingly words, food and drink, sleep and amusements. May we be more alert in the custody of our senses.’” – Pope Benedict XVI http://w2.vatican.va/content/benedict-xvi/en/messages/lent/documents/hf_ben-xvi_mes_20081211_lent-2009.html

“Fasting loves not many words, deems wealth superfluous, scorns pride, commends humility, helps man to perceive what is frail and paltry.” – Augustine, Sermon LXXII

This last quote is not like the others, but I’m fascinated by the physical correlation to our spiritual practices. How does letting go of what is superfluous renew our grasp on what is essential? Fasting actually prompts our bodies to seek energy from other sources than bread alone, trains them to seek the good and release the bad, and triggers healing processes on a cellular level. “Free radicals can be generated by poorly functioning mitochondria (the powerhouses of the cell). The switch between eating normally and fasting causes cells to temporarily experience lower-than-usual levels of glucose (blood sugar), and they are forced to begin using other sources of less readily available energy, like fatty acids. This can cause the cells to turn on survival processes to remove the unhealthy mitochondria and replace them with healthy ones over time, thus reducing the production of free radicals in the long-term.” – Douglas Bennion, Martin Wegman, and Michael Guo http://theconversation.com/feast-then-famine-how-fasting-might-make-our-cells-more-resilient-to-stress-38808

Consider the Groundhog

Posted on February 2, 2014 by Jenn Cavanaugh

“Presentation in the Temple” by Fra Angelico. Come to think of it, in these portrayals with the swaddling clothes and halo, Jesus does look like a candle. Do you think he ever sees his own shadow?

By some strange coincidence, February 2nd is both the rather goofy custom of Groundhog’s Day and the rather more solemn feast of Candlemas, a holiday celebrating the Presentation of Jesus at the Temple, his Meeting with Simeon and Anna, and the Purification of Mary. Random, right? Not at all. The two are intimately connected. (The Super Bowl, however, is a moveable feast and so, no matter what anybody tells you today, not particularly related to this episode in the story of divine revelation.)
Christians have been observing the interconnected events commemorated by Candlemas since the 4th or 5th century. Mary took Jesus with her to the temple to be dedicated as the firstborn and for her own rite of purification 40 days after he was born according to Jewish law. According to the New Testament Simeon recognized that the child would be a light to the Gentiles, hence the candle motif and the Eastern church’s name for the day: Hypapante, or “Meeting.”

As Candlemas falls close to the midpoint of winter, it accrued additional cultural significance in many countries. It marked the really, truly bitter end of the Christmas season, when all the decorations must come down and people mentally moved on to wondering when they could safely plant some more food already. Around this time the wild beasts, dormant during the brunt of the season, would tentatively emerge to gauge if the worst of the weather had passed or if a longer winter’s nap might be in order. In the UK, folks expected to see anything from wolves to snakes to bears, but badgers were somehow singled out as nature’s forecasters in this regard – I’m guessing because they made for less dangerous viewing. Badgers apparently being in shorter supply in Germany and the New World, the Pennsylvania Dutch made do with a woodchuck or groundhog.

So Punxsutawney Phil is essentially the Easter Bunny of Candlemas.

Incidentally, if you’re one of the 3 in 7 Americans who can never remember if seeing his shadow means six more weeks of winter if it’s the other way around perhaps it’s the French influence. They have contradictory traditional sayings which predict that a sunny Candlemas, or Chandeleur, portends the final hour and/or the first of forty more days of winter. What the French can agree on, however, is that crepes must be eaten today or dire consequences will ensue.

Making crepes the chocolate bunnies of Candlemas.

Different traditions focus on different aspects of the day, so if you’d like to get observant, you can start almost anywhere:
• Light candles and have crepes for dinner. (The French wheat industry thanks you!)
• Host a Wives’ Feast. (This and “Women’s Christmas” on Epiphany are opportunities for people of a certain gender who may find themselves standing in the kitchen for most of the holidays to sit down and talk about something other than oven temperatures and dietary restrictions.)
• I realize no one’s ever thought of this before, but how about a pancake breakfast at church?
• Have child dedications during service and/or a special blessing or time of prayer for the newborns and new parents in the congregation.
• Pass out candles during the benediction to symbolize carrying the light of the world out with us as we go. Invite people to carry and light them in a dark place or as a symbol of their holding a dark place up in prayer. Or set up candles around the room labeled with various “areas of life” (health, finances, relationships, work, etc.) and offer a “Meeting” time at the end of the service. Invite people to light their candle in some area of life in which they want to see Jesus and send people out with them lit. (According to tradition, anyone who makes it home with the candle still lit won’t die that year: BONUS!)

The Second Day of Christmas: Old, Familiar Carols

Posted on December 26, 2013 by Jenn Cavanaugh

I’m spending Christmas in Marseille this year with friends who have made a cozy home here for their family and anyone else in need of one for the season. Eleven stockings were hung by the old French fireplace and we had so many amazing meals in the last couple of days I’m not sure which one was supposed to be “the holiday meal.” Every time I walk into the kitchen someone is frying up lardons and the collections of bottles and candy wrappers hand-carried here from around the globe have mysteriously multiplied. At a civilized 9 o’clock or so this morning-after our host is putting on the coffee before he runs to pick up some fresh croissants for breakfast. The kids are wrapping the dining table in the festive scraps of paper from yesterday in preparation for an elaborate, cooperative painting project received as a gift yesterday

Besides the food and the company and the respite of not having to do anything urgently for the first time in almost five months of transitioning to a new country, I will remember this about this Christmas: I heard the bells on Christmas Day. At odd times, for ten minutes at a time, then again in half an hour, playing no discernible carol, but wild – uproarious, even. Untamed bells tumbling joyous proclamation into the windy streets. The only people out were attempting their business as usual – joggers on the promenade dodging the spray of the normally calm Mediterranean; Muslim men making a point of spending the day off smoking at the café like any other day; older folk navigating an unfamiliar pharmacie de garde to treat their old, familiar ailments; tourists at Notre Dame ignoring the holiday in acts of devotion to their travel agendas.

Notre Dame de la Garde, Marseille

While parts of the church have rediscovered Advent, reclaiming this season of anticipation in the midst of our culture’s frenzy of consumption, for most of us Christmas begins and ends with a flurry of paper, and when the presents are done, it’s over, back to business as usual. This year I’m thinking more about Christmas as a season, the twelve days that began yesterday and end in Epiphany. I’m new to this, so I sincerely hope this won’t be last my last and final reckoning with the significance of the Christmas season, but today it strikes me that it’s about living prophetically into the world’s business as usual.
Longfellow’s poem “Christmas Bells” acknowledges the phenomenon of celebrating a day that changed history, that forever altered the topography of the spiritual playing fields of reality, and finding nothing changed. It’s the same old songs of peace, love and joy sung by people who remain as contentious, difficult and miserable as ever. We sing carols of this miraculous event that revealed God to and with us in ways hardly imagined before and we look forward to doing it again next year. That’s what the church calendar does – takes mind-blowing unique births, deaths, resurrections and revelations and works them into the rhythm of our lives to be remembered, observed, and re-lived again and again. And so Christmas is the season of going back to the fields rejoicing with angelsong still ringing in our ears, knowing that unto us a son and savior has been given. Christmas is the time of pondering in our hearts what all these promises that have come true mean, because there he lies, the Lord of all, bound in rags, and he needs to be fed and changed again. We have come to worship, found it all to be just as it was said, and now it is time to return home another way, knowing what we know now about the dark politics of the place of his birth, maybe never hearing news of the place again. We make our way back to real life listening to those louder, deeper bells ringing that “God is not dead, nor doth he sleep.”

“Christmas Bells” by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

I heard the bells on Christmas Day
Their old familiar carols play,
And wild and sweet
The words repeat
Of peace on earth, good-will to men!

And thought how, as the day had come,
The belfries of all Christendom
Had rolled along
The unbroken song
Of peace on earth, good-will to men!

Till, ringing, singing on its way,
The world revolved from night to day,
A voice, a chime
A chant sublime
Of peace on earth, good-will to men!

Then from each black accursed mouth
The cannon thundered in the South,
And with the sound
The carols drowned
Of peace on earth, good-will to men!

It was as if an earthquake rent
The hearth-stones of a continent,
And made forlorn
The households born
Of peace on earth, good-will to men!

And in despair I bowed my head;
“There is no peace on earth,” I said;
“For hate is strong,
And mocks the song
Of peace on earth, good-will to men!”

Then pealed the bells more loud and deep:
“God is not dead; nor doth he sleep!
The Wrong shall fail,
The Right prevail,
With peace on earth, good-will to men!”

A Protestant at Lent

Posted on February 13, 2013 by Jenn Cavanaugh

Stretching Out in Faith

Lent is the season of the Church calendar before Easter. The word itself comes from the Old English meaning “lengthen,” in reference to the lengthening of the days in Spring. The practice of setting aside a time of spiritual preparation before Easter began very early in Church history as most people were baptized and officially joined the Church on Easter. Together they would spend the weeks prior praying, fasting, learning the tenets of the faith, and getting their habits and affairs in line with their new lives in Christ. As the Church grew and became culturally acceptable its leaders began encouraging members to join the acolytes in this process annually, as a way of shaking off the trappings of a merely cultural Christianity (we’re talking 4^th century here; this is not a new phenomenon) and rededicating themselves to following Christ together body, soul, mind, and spirit.

Protestants have a hard time figuring out how to handle Lent, because we actually have to figure it out for ourselves. Orthodox and Catholic Christians have more established parameters informing them when to pray and fast and a more coherent structure of spiritual authorities clarifying these parameters as needed. Historically, Protestants have rejected many of these parameters and structures as adding requirements, conditions, and intermediaries to our walk with God where scripture, faith, and Christ Himself should suffice. As a Protestant I appreciate the inclination to unfetter our freedom in Christ and yet I can see how my Christian heritage has cut me off from Christian traditions that are useful, faithful, and ultimately freeing. Statistically fewer of us have grown up on the spectrum between confusion and mortal fear about doing certain things certain days and not others, but we’ve also lost that sense of collective spiritual rhythm and practice. Recently, many Protestants have been trying to reclaim the benefits of a common Church calendar and traditional spiritual practices without the sense of obligation or tying our works too tightly to our hope of salvation. We have lost some of the comfort of community, but gained the advantage of being able to enter these seasons mindfully, intentionally and without a sense of imposition.

Letting God Choose Your Fast

Spiritual disciplines help us learn to control ourselves, but we’re not to be cruel masters. One indicator of whether we control a habit or it controls us is how moderate the habit is. If you watch a couple shows a week as a way to unwind with roommates or family, giving up TV for Lent won’t make you a “better Christian.” But if you feel your prime time drained daily by the tube or there’s a particular show you know is coloring your outlook and language in decidedly un-Christlike ways, give it up and take up a more prayerful habit during the time it frees. Maybe you sleep too much, maybe not enough. Eating chocolate or drinking wine to celebrate special occasions doesn’t indicate unhealthy use. If you discern that you are using them on a regular basis to stifle your negative thoughts, use this time to break that pattern and take your worries, moods, memories, and pain to God instead.

Write down 3 things that seem like good ideas to you, then draw a couple of blank lines to designate space in which to receive ideas other than your own and pray over the page. Maybe this year Lent will be about cultivating gratitude for what you have and committing to celebrate it daily instead of denying it to yourself. Maybe it will be about living more simply with less stuff or maintaining or organizing what you have to make it functional or useful again. Maybe it will be more about giving generously than giving up. In scripture 40 days is a long, yet finite time. Things shift over the course of 40 days or years in the biblical stories. 40 days is a credible and creditable amount of time to commit to trying on a new habit or changing an old one without it feeling onerously indefinite. What is God nudging you toward? How can you work it deeper into your life in this season?

Epiphanies Part 2: …And Where It Settles

Posted on February 7, 2013 by Jenn Cavanaugh

Click here for Part 1.

Epiphanies have to do with seeing, in the deepest sense. A spotlight comes on and shines on something that has been there all along and, as if for the first time, we truly see it. The work of the artist is to train one’s eyes to see and communicate it such a way that others see it as well, to witness and bear witness. Flannery O’Connor wrote, “Your beliefs will be the light by which you see, but they will not be what you see and they will not be a substitute for seeing.” We require light to see, which is why light is a primary metaphor for describing epiphanies: realizations come to light, connections are illuminated, and so on. Following Christ in the world depends heavily on having eyes to see and ears to hear. Artists have a particular calling to make what they see visible to others, but we are all called to live as witnesses – to see and hear and make what sense we can of God’s presence, action, and guidance – and to respond accordingly.

A quiet consensus has formed in this show – that the light by which we see enters through the cracks and crevices and that it settles, well, just about everywhere, really – everywhere we have trained our eyes to see and taken the time to look. Poet Mike McGeehon sees the light settling in the enforced pause of disparate souls at a stoplight.

In all of us here

in the 40-second meeting,

settling into our seats

for a moment together

where the intersection is.

– from “Where the Light Settles”

by Mike McGeehon

Photographer Leslie A. Zukor has a theophany by the natural light of the natural world

“The Burning Bush” by Leslie A. Zukor

while Ron Simmons digitally enhances his photographs to reveal the prismatic refractions surrounding saints making visible all the colors hidden in the light itself.

“Apparitions” by Ron Simmons

Alison Peacock sees a heavenly father in the earthly. The young Seeker in my poem and in the beautiful collage Trisha Gilmore created for her knows God’s presence before she can articulate it in

the cheek-roughness… of this… tree I can’t name… but… I will someday

– from “Seeker” by Jenn Cavanaugh

in Mars Hill Review 22 (2003)

Autumn Kegley paints her revelling revelation of the joy-filled life. Karla Manus encounters such a life and sees her relatively comfortable, joyless self in stark relief. Elizabeth W. Noyes returns again and again to the return of the full moon in which she catches sight of “infinite possibilities for echoing what is poetic, magical, mysterious and whole in the human heart, and mine.”

In curating this show, I’ve recovered a season. Between the times in which we wait for God to come and prepare for God to act, we have been given a time to train our senses to recognizing God’s presence and present work among us. In the years to come, Epiphany will be for me a time to focus on seeing God in the world, recognizing Christ in others, and becoming more receptive to the connections the Spirit makes.

The Epiphanies group show will be open at Capitol Hill Presbyterian Church of Seattle until February 14th. You can call the church office to make an appointment to see it during a weekday, join us for a service: Sunday, 2/10 @ 9:45 am or Ash Wednesday, 2/13 @ 7 pm, or drop by during the Capitol Hill Arts Walk, 5-8 pm, 2/14. See our Facebook page for more information and pictures http://www.facebook.com/CapHillPresArts

Advent Reflection – Day 4

Posted on December 5, 2012 by Jenn Cavanaugh

“Let’s not deceive ourselves. ‘Your redemption is drawing near’ (Luke 21:28), whether we know it or not, and the only question is: Are we going to let it come to us too, or are we going to resist it? Are we going to join in this movement that comes down from heaven to earth, or are we going to close ourselves off? Christmas is coming – whether it is with us or without us depends on each and every one of us. Such a true Advent happening now creates something different from the anxious, petty, depressed, feeble Christian spirit that we see again and again, and that again and again wants to make Christianity contemptible…. Advent creates people, new people. We too are supposed to become new people in Advent. Look up, you whose gaze is fixed on this earth, who are spellbound by the little events and changes on the surface of the earth. Look up to these words, you who have turned away from heaven disappointed. Look up, you whose eyes are heavy with tears and who are crying over the fact that the earth has gracelessly torn us away. Look up, you who, burdened with guilt, cannot lift your eyes. Look up, your redemption is drawing near. Something different from what you see daily will happen. Just be aware, be watchful, wait just another short moment. Wait and something quite new will break over you: God will come.” – Dietrich Bonhoeffer

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