Lenten Devotional Series
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As the Days of Lent Wind Down I Wonder...
by Pat Ruch
It’s almost time to come out of the desert, the days of Lent are winding down.
Did I really enter the desert this year? I could have done so much more. ..yes? Why didn’t I? The only one I cheated was myself. What kept me back?
Was it too uncomfortable, too inconvenient at times? Going into the desert is like going on the neighborhood canoe trip in a way. I’m not a camper. All the effort to put together everything everyone will need; all the encouraging nudges to motivate others toward the common goal; and then there’s the bathrooms, not. Nowhere do the gospels mention indoor plumbing.
So I am dabbling at the edge of the desert, giving up an addicting card game as I have in the past, using the time saved to be present or to call relatives. Prayed ..some (a stretch), thought …some, read the incredible devotionals that brought me back to the desert’s edge, sometimes even made stabs at Friday fasting per my Catholic upbringing. Maybe I lost my way.
Then I recall how valuable it is to lose my way from time to time. During my traveling days, I made it a rule to get lost. To take a couple extra turns away from whatever museum or postcard captured highlight I visited after all–that’s where the authentic people and moments could be found..and sometimes a glimmer of insight.
Maybe I reached past the edge.
Early March my senses flooded, driving out all before me. A Trib headline carried a mother’s cry, “Can you please put a sheet over him?” Her son, an Urban Prep student, Mr. Deonte Hoard was shot and killed as he returned from Monday study group, days before receiving the coveted red and gold tie. Urban Prep students are amazing, respectful, focused, call each other Mr., wearing ties/jackets to class, get into college (100%) and celebrate their college acceptances in a ceremony when they receive the defining striped tie. Nine years in Englewood, this was Urban Prep’s first loss.
All the Irish and Appalachian music I was then learning transformed, misting with images, melody and phrases, wrapping, wrapping around my head, words constantly changing. One melody emerged that was, somehow, all melodies. And a refrain,
Put a sheet on my child, put a sheet on my son
He was smiling at breakfast, and now he is gone
He was going to college, he’d worked very hard
Put a sheet on my child, put a sheet on my son
They are fathers and brothers, classmates and loves
Deacons and toddlers all killed with a gun
Put a sheet on my child, put a sheet on my son
Can’t we all stand together and fight it as one
Maybe in the silence and searching, the chiding ourselves and back peddling of our personal Lents, God still finds us, gives us voice, through the gifts we’ve been given and offers fulfillment….if we carry it forward.
Thanks be to God.
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