From Your Pastor

February-March

Lent 2012

FROM YOUR PASTOR

Can Ash Wednesday[i] already be in three weeks? Just a rhetorical question. It is—February 22. We will offer a traditional service with the imposition of Ashes at 7:30. I suppose with the extremely mild winter (so far) it shouldn’t be too mind-bending to recently have had what appeared to be spring days. On Monday I was in Manhattan at Christ UMC for a meeting. Walking around mid-town on Park Avenue I would not have been surprised to see shorts and tank tops. It was around 60 degrees, more like April than January. I hesitate to be sanguine about unusual weather. There is a Yiddish expression Kaynahorah which literally means the evil eye, but is used in the sense that one shouldn’t say something good or something bad will happen; an incantation to ward off evil influences. So forget my weather report.

          This little poem by Wendell Berry is in defense of the snow we haven’t seen much of since October.

Like Snow

Suppose we did our work

like the snow, quietly, quietly,

leaving nothing out.

So Lent is almost upon us. I’m unsure whether this word from our worship planners in Nashville fits us here in Wilton, but here it is anyway. They ask whether Lent requires any preparation as it is a season of preparation.

It certainly is. But all too often among Protestants in the U.S., at least, we have treated Lent as an extended Ash Wednesday or Holy Week, focusing on self-reflection, confession of sin and spiritual disciplines for our own sake, individually.

The primary purpose of Lent, however, as we announce on Ash Wednesday, is not self-reflection, but a time in which we as a whole congregation come alongside people to prepare them for baptism, for reconciliation, or for taking significant next steps in discipleship and ministry in Christ's name. While we certainly engage spiritual disciplines and self-denial as we do so, we do not do these things solely for ourselves as if Lent were some sort of personal spiritual marathon. We engage these disciplines more intensely for the sake of others on their intensive journeys of preparation.  

Put another way, in Lent, the whole church becomes midwife for new life to be born or renewed among us.

The group that participated in the Embracing and Adult Faith, the Marcus Borg study for Advent, had some conversation about how we might continue our small group ministries. It appears that even short defined programs of 4-6 weeks aren’t always possible for many in the congregation. We refuse to throw in the towel. Our idea is to create an ongoing small group experience that is more of a movable feast.

Our Superintendent, Betsy Ott, at a District Training event last week suggested that we need to abstain from the use of the term “study” in our Twitter, Facebook, and texting culture. So it will not be a study. It will be regularly scheduled time and place for fellowship and conversation, but will not require regular attendance. We will start with a popular book which anyone can purchase and read. If you can get to a meeting during the weeks that we are discussing a particular book or other medium, you will be able to easily participate. We will consider using engaging recent movies and are open to suggestions for other venues. The way we envision it is to meet weekly in a participant’s home; the details will be announced and Emailed and in the case of a particular book note the dates it will be the topic for the evening. In the case of a movie we would view it together. 

The consideration for this is that we enjoy each others' company and everyone has a perspective or idea to contribute. We want to deepen and expand opportunities to share our lives together. Leadership will only require a willingness to get things rolling for a particular evening. We hope that it will evolve in ways to engage more friends and ZH folks. Inviting friends would be a benefit and all are welcome to join the group. Since we will use popular materials I would think teenagers could easily join the conversations.

We plan to give it a try during Lent. More details will follow. So be prepared.