Start of Lent

I realized this morning that Lent started yesterday. From my church background, I didn't grow up celebrating Lent. As I child, I remember Holy Week and special services on Palm Sunday, Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, and Easter Sunday, but not much before then.

Yesterday was Ash Wednesday and the previous day Mardi Gras, which is called "Carnival" in France. We went to IKEA yesterday and my kids got their faces painted as Alex the Lion (Madagascar 2), a princess, and a butterfly.

I now appreciate the liturgical year that many branches of Christianity have celebrated for 2 millenia now. Seasons like Advent and Lent allow us to remember and engage in the important events that these led to.

Lent consists of 40 days, even though there actually are 47 days between Ash Wednesday and Easter. This is because technically, the Sundays aren't part of Lent.

For my Lenten meditations this year, I'm reading Garth Hewitt's "Pilgrims & Peacemakers: A Journey through Lent towards Jerusalem" (Oxford: The Bible Reading Fellowship, 1995). Hewitt is a British singer/songwriter and has over 20 albums and through his songs seeks to tell stories about the forgotten and oppressed. He also was (and maybe still is) World Affairs Advisor for the Guildford Diocese and Director of the Amos Trust--a justice and peace organization. He is also on the staff of St. Saviour's Church in Guildford and is a Director of the Greenbelt Festival.

His book covers different parts of Israel, a country I got to visit in 1995. Recently I've begun reading David Pryce Jones' "Betrayal: France, the Arabs, and the Jews" (New York: Encounter Books, 2006). Certainly the number of reported AntiSemitic acts is on the rise in France. This book makes a point of how the French government during the last 200 years has encouraged Arabs and Muslims to maintain their own cultural identity, while granting citizenship to Jews on condition that they possess no distinct identity. Extending this requirement to foreign policy, the French ruling elite have consistently opposed Zionism and the state of Israel itself.

We have friends in Paris that are Jewish, as well as friends who are Arab or North African and Muslim. My wife and children are out right now with one Muslim mother and her 2 daughters who are friends, as well as a French mother and her 2 kids. We all get along, despite our religious differences.

Certainly the situation in Jerusalem and the Middle East is complicated. We are exhorted to pray for the peace of Jerusalem. Arab Christians are stuck in the middle of this, as they are neither Muslim nor Jewish.

We have a sign in our living room that says "shalom" (the Hebrew word for "peace"). I feel we need to get another one right next to it that says "salaam" (the Arabic word for "peace").

I guess I have many more questions than answers about the complex situations in France and the Middle East right now. While I don't think that my current sphere of influence reaches these global leaders, I can, as a Christian, work in my own backyard for peace and fraternity with other Christians, Jews, and Muslims. This doesn't mean that I accept everything they think or believe is right. I don't think that all roads lead to God, as I believe that Jesus is the only way to justification with God. However, I need to properly respect and treat them as fellow humans created in the image of God, rather than having a pugnacious attitude. We need to be vigilant to Jesus' orders of being wise as serpents and harmless as doves.

I'm actually excited about this Lenten season. I'm not sure yet what I'll give up. Several people have given up Facebook, but that's something that my work really would suffer with if I gave it up. It's not about giving up something to earn God's favor. It rather is giving up something desirable in order to think about what Jesus gave up on His way to the cross.