Soul Tending - Celtic Lent

The Christian church invites us into awareness of Lent beginning this coming Wednesday (Ash Wednesday). These 40 days have long been a time of preparation for the observance and celebration of Easter, the shocking and glorious announcement that Love cannot be stopped and Divine presence cannot be erased. Easter is a startling and redemptive shout that resounds through all of Creation that winter death always emerges into Spring life, and Love mocked and killed always blooms again to invite us all home again. Christians throughout history have opened themselves to this coming and resurrecting of Ultimate Love by setting aside 40 days (plus the Sundays that fall within those 40 days) to “prepare” the heart. This is Lent.   

Sadly, as the human ego is always prone to do, the idea of “preparation” and opening oneself to Love, easily deteriorates into a self-focused achievement instead of an emptying oneself in order to receive.    The ego declares “I” gave up something or “I” did something or “I” suffered. This is a normal statement from the human ego but it is never a good stopping point and certainly not something to be declared as if “I” have achieved “my” own Lenten accomplishment. In order to have a meaning-filled preparatory time, giving up or adding of behaviors or disciplines must be seen as a time of reflecting on the absence of ego fulfillment or engaging in behaviors or rituals to open myself to that which is bigger, greater, and more glorious than just my small ego. Preparation is not about being able to say “I” prepared. Instead it is about preparing the soil of the human soul so that seeds of love, hope, resurrection, and all redemptive possibilities can find good ground in which to take root, push through hardened winter ground, and find the warmth of Spring sun ready to nourish and call it forth.

ANY discipline, commitment, or shift of mindset that looks to plow up soul-soil, or to invite the opening of the self to the warmth of new life is a worthy preparatory discipline. Any preparatory period should not be allowed to devolve into a sort of item on a cosmic to-do list that we can check off when completed. That attitude would do nothing more than strengthen the ego and alienate us from our truest nature. Instead, preparation is plowing soil, awakening soul, becoming aware of ego and letting go into Great Love. This great task is not a seasonal requirement or a to-do item, a depriving of oneself or something to be announced to others. It is an opportunity to let go and relax into New Life. Therefore, ask yourself if there is something to which you you would like to commit for these preparatory days that would help you. Sometimes it’s something to give up, but often it is something to add. What do you need to assist your awareness of letting go, hoping, and falling into God? 

The ancient Celts have some lovely suggestions.

They, of course, may have given up a behavior or desire in preparation, but their ways may also be instructive to you with fresh possibilities. Here are a few possibilities. Perhaps caring for a neighbor in need, a friend in crisis, or a family member who is lonely in a special way during Lent would interest your heart. Maybe wandering in Nature on a more disciplined or deliberate schedule is what you would like to do as you give up the comfort of heated home and go into the crisp air of late winter. Maybe reading or writing poetry that captures your soul story in new ways would assist you in these days, or how about the possibility of practicing something that you’ve been embarrassed or apprehensive to try such as art, writing, meeting neighbors, or cooking healthy meals for each week’s needs. What about getting rid of one item in your home each day of Lent that you don’t need as a tangible practice of letting go (and you could have a moment of taking these items to someone who does need them at the end of the season).

The ancient Celts actually had three 40-day preparations during each year. These three deliberate times of awakening awareness toward soul tending preceded Easter, the Transfiguration, and Christmas. These people were quite dedicated to the regular pattern of waking up over and over again to our need to let go, plow the ground of ego so that soul can shine, and falling into the embrace of the close presence of Divine Love.     

-Kirk Webb, Founder & Director of The Celtic Center

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