I witnessed something on Ash Wednesday this year that still haunts me. After morning Mass, our pastor placed two bowls of ashes in front of the altar. Returning to church later that day, I noticed a line of people waiting to sprinkle themselves. Most remarkable was that I had never seen most of them before and haven’t seen them since. Our pastor confirmed for me that scores of people come to church only on Ash Wednesday, although some return for Easter and some for Christmas.
However skewed the liturgical practice of these “Ash Wednesday Catholics,” they stand as a witness to what many are yearning for today: a real challenge. We tend to think Catholics defect to other Christian communities because they find Catholicism too hard when in fact just as many go elsewhere because they think it is not hard enough. I am starting to lose count of friends who have chosen to frequent Orthodox churches, drawn by the seriousness with which the Eastern eremitic tradition takes fasting, abstinence, and the divine liturgy.
Cold showers, ice baths, intermittent fasting, extreme marathons, minimalist living, Exodus 90, Dr. Jordan Peterson: do they not tell us something? Are not the Pioneers, the retirees-at-thirty, the homesteaders, and the diehard DIYs revealing an inner drive for sacrifice and self-abnegation?
And what message does the Church give them? Sometimes (though not always), that they are fine just the way they are. Mind you, this is a completely different message from “God loves you no matter what.” That message is certainly true. But if we are naturally drawn to make sacrifices for our spouses, children, and parents out of sheer love for them, how much stronger must our innate desire be to sacrifice our own needs and desires for Love Himself?
The beautiful thing is that, since we can never equal the sacrifice God has made for us, our sacrifices for Him do not need to be “extraordinary.” We just need to recognize and take advantage of them whenever they arise. “Miss no single opportunity of making some small sacrifice,” writes the Little Flower, “here by a smiling look, there by a kindly word; always doing the smallest right and doing it all for love.”
Granted, many of today’s pop-culture sacrifices are made in the name of self-improvement and inner-fulfillment. Yet it is not hard to demonstrate that even these we make for love of something. That ultimate “something” is of course the Good, and when young people are shown that such a Good really exists, they elevate and channel their self-imposed sacrifices in entirely new and astounding ways.
I grew up in a church whose main message—in hymns, homilies, and collage-felt-banners—was “We are an Easter people.” We are, of course. But we are also a people longing for the rest of the story. How did we become an Easter people? Who did it? What did He do? What are we to do?
This past Lent, the National Catholic Register surveyed bishops asking whether they planned to relieve their flocks from the required fast and abstinence this past Ash Wednesday given its coincidence with Valentine’s Day (they all responded “no,” of course). I really wish they had spared the bishops the extra email and asked the faithful what they thought. I think they would have been surprised to discover that a large swath of Catholics would have said that they were more looking forward to Ash Wednesday than Valentine’s Day (and apparently, several of them do not even attend weekly Mass!). Christians, Jews, Muslims, Buddhists, agnostics, atheists—let alone Catholics—want “Lent.” Deep down, we all know we need it. We are often waiting for the Church to remind us just why we need it rather than making us feel sorry that we have to enjoy a New York strip and box of Godiva on Tuesday rather than Wednesday.
When our Lord invited us to take up our cross and follow Him (cf. Matt. 16:24), He could have prefaced the invitation with “go find a cross,” but He didn’t. The truth is we needn’t look far. An addicted spouse, a rebellious child, a disruptive neighbor, an angry driver: taking up the cross may require me first to take the plank out of my own eye (cf. Matt. 7:4) and see that I have been that person myself. Chronic arthritis, back pain, a simple food allergy: embracing any of these gives us the assurance that we are following His will rather than our own.
During the pandemic, and despite the lower weekly Mass turnout, I noticed more people returning to the Good Friday liturgy. Perhaps it was because we had more time on our hands. But perhaps it was because we were trying to make sense of the suffering that surrounded us. I also heard a more vociferous “Crucify Him! Crucify Him!” on Passion Sunday. Why? Perhaps because we were more aware that our mortal suffering calls for the suffering of an immortal Savior, which in turn reminds us that our sins are the very cause of that Savior’s passion and death.
We often think that what we need are better politicians, a better political system, or an ultimate victory in the culture war. What we really need, Pope Benedict XVI reminded us, is to (re)encounter the one who gives meaning to both our sufferings and our innate desire to deny ourselves. In Spe Salvi, Benedict urged us to recognize that the encounter with God in Christ is not just “informative” but “performative” (Spe Salvi, 4). In other words, it can “change our lives, so that we know we are redeemed through the hope that it expresses.” He continues:
Christianity did not bring a message of social revolution like that of the ill-fated Spartacus, whose struggle led to so much bloodshed. Jesus was not Spartacus, he was not engaged in a fight for political liberation like Barabbas or Bar-Kochba. Jesus, who himself died on the Cross, brought something totally different: an encounter with the Lord of all lords, an encounter with the living God and thus an encounter with a hope stronger than the sufferings of slavery, a hope which therefore transformed life and the world from within.
Spe Salvi, 4
The growing trend of willingly accepting extreme challenges that demand heroic self-discipline and self-denial shows that we are not alright just the way we are. We want to change. Nothing offers that opportunity more than the Gospel. We long to be loved and realize more and more that to love means to change and be changed. Change involves suffering. Change is a challenge. Yet whatever cross change brings, it opens a horizon onto the “performative” reality of the Christian hope by which we are saved (cf. Rom. 8:24 and Spe Salvi, 4).
Photo by Sean Benesh on Unsplash
