Lent 2013, XVIII

XVIII. I think one of the things that I should do from this position of detachment (or from as close to it as I can get) is to look at daily life through clearer eyes. This is Lenten life, the life of expectant emptiness. Some people are called to live their whole lives in this way. In the final analysis, the distinction I’ve made between “daily life” and “Lenten life” is purely symbolic. There should be a little bit of Lent in every day of my life, and little bit of the ordinary even on Good Friday, if only to symbolize that Jesus did not come to destroy our nature but to redeem it. Those who hope to leave our nature utterly behind at the Resurrection will be sorely disappointed. The Risen Lord ate fish, after all. Cooked some fish too, as a matter of fact. Did He have to eat? No. But I think He probably enjoyed it. That is the ultimate freedom to enjoy, I think. The ability of the Risen Lord to eat or not eat as He chooses for all eternity. But I digress. Even taken on a broader view, there is no life no matter how ordinary that does not have some Lent in it. We all die in the end, if nothing else, and on that day, like it or not, ready or not, we will go through the final detachment from all earthly goods. It would probably be good to practice once or twice before then. And no life, no matter how Lenten it is, is without a little bit of the ordinary. Most mystics eat at least sometimes. Even the ones who went for years with nothing but the Eucharist passing their lips still breathed air. They still inhabited ordinary bodies, with sweat glands and flatulence. The balance