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Lent (the word
"Lent" comes from the Old English "lencten," meaning "springtime) lasts from
Ash Wednesday to the Vespers of Holy Saturday -- forty days + six Sundays
which don't count as "Lent" liturgically. The Latin name for Lent, Quadragesima,
means forty and refers to the forty days Christ spent in the desert which
is the origin of the Season.The last two weeks of Lent are known as
"Passiontide," made up of Passion Week and Holy Week. The last three days
of Holy Week -- Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, and Holy Saturday -- are known
as the "Sacred Triduum."
The focus of this Season is the Cross and penance, penance, penance as we
imitate Christ's forty days of fasting, like Moses and Elias before Him,
and await the triumph of Easter. We fast (see below), abstain, mortify the
flesh, give alms, and think more of charitable works. Awakening each morning
with the thought, "How might I make amends for my sins? How can I serve God
in a reparative way? How can I serve others today?" is the attitude to have.
We also practice mortifications by "giving up something" that would be a
sacrifice to do without. The sacrifice could be anything from desserts to
television to the marital embrace, and it can entail, too, taking on something
unpleasant that we'd normally avoid, for example, going out of one's way
to do another's chores, performing "random acts of kindness," etc. A practice
that might help some, especially small children, to think sacrificially is
to make use of "Sacrifice Beads" in the
same way that St. Thérèse of Lisieux did as a child.
Because of the focus on penance and reparation, it is traditional to make
sure we go to Confession at least once during this Season to fulfill the
precept of the Church that we go to Confession at least once a year,
and receive the Eucharist at least once a year during Eastertide. A beautiful
old custom associated with Lenten Confession is
to, before going to see the priest, bow before each member of your household
and to any you've sinned against, and say, "In the Name of Christ, forgive
me if I've offended you." One responds with "God will forgive you." Done
with an extensive examination of conscience and a sincere heart, this practice
can be quite healing (also note that confessing sins to a priest is a Sacrament
which remits mortal and venial sins; confessing sins to those you've offended
is a sacramental which, like all sacramentals one piously takes advantage
of, remits venial sins. Both are quite good for the soul!)
In addition to mortification and charity, seeing and living Lent as a forty
day spiritual retreat is a good thing to do. Spiritual reading should be
engaged in (over and above one's regular Lectio
Divina). Maria von Trapp recommended "the Book of Jeremias and the works
of Saints, such as The Ascent of Mount Carmel, by St. John of the Cross;
The Introduction to a Devout Life, by St. Francis de Sales; The Story of
a Soul, by St. Thérèse of Lisieux; The Spiritual Castle, by
St. Teresa of Avila; the Soul of the Apostolate, by Abbot Chautard; the books
of Abbot Marmion, and similar works."
As to prayer, praying the beautiful Seven
Penitential Psalms (Psalms 6, 31, 37, 50, 101, 129, and 142) is a traditional
practice. It is most traditional to pray all of these each day of Lent, but
if time is an issue, you can pray them all on just the Fridays of Lent, or,
because there are seven of them, and seven Fridays in Lent, you might want
to consider praying one on each Friday. These Psalms, which include the Psalms
"Miserére" and "De Profundis," are perfect expressions of contrition
and prayers for mercy. So apt are these Psalms at expressing contrition that,
as he lay dying in A.D. 430, St. Augustine asked that a monk write them in
large letters near his bed so he could easily read them.
Another great prayer for this season is that of St. Ephraem, Doctor of the
Church (d. 373). This prayer is often prayed with a
prostration after each stanza:
O Lord and Master
of my life, take from me the spirit of sloth, despondency, lust of power,
and idle talk;
But grant rather the spirit of chastity, humility, patience, and love to
thy servant.
Yea, O Lord and King, grant me to see my own transgressions, and not to judge
my brother; for blessed art Thou unto the ages of ages.
In the East, this
prayer is prayed liturgically during Lent and is followed by "O God, cleanse
me a sinner" prayed twelve times, with a bow following each, and one last
prostration.
Also, on all Fridays during Lent, one may gain a plenary
indulgence, under the usual conditions, by
reciting the En ego, O bone et dulcissime
Iesu (Prayer Before a Crucifix) before an image of Christ crucified.
Food in Lent
According to the
1983 Code of Canon Law, the rule for the universal Church during Lent
is abstain on all Fridays (inside or outside of Lent) and to both fast and
abstain on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday.
Some traditional Catholics might follow the older pattern of
fasting and abstinence during this time, which
for the universal Church required:
-
Ash Wednesday,
all Fridays, and all Saturdays: fasting and total abstinence.
This means 3 meatless meals -- with the two smaller meals not equalling in
size the main meal of the day -- and no snacking.
-
Mondays, Tuesdays,
Wednesdays (except Ash Wednesday), and Thursdays: fasting and
partial abstinence from meat. This means three meals -- with the two
smaller meals not equalling in size the main meal of the day -- and no snacking,
but meat can be eaten at the principle meal.
On those days of
fasting and abstinence, meatless soup is traditional
(see recipes). Sundays, of course, are always
free of fasting and abstinence; even in the heart of Lent, Sundays are about
the glorious Resurrection. This pattern of fasting and abstinence ends after
the Vigil Mass of Holy Saturday.
As to special Lenten foods, vegetables, seafoods, salads, pastas, and beans
mark the Season, in addition to the meatless soups. The fasting of this time
once even precluded the eating of eggs and fats, so the chewy pretzel became
the bread and symbol of the times. They'd always been a Christian food, ever
since Roman times, their very shape being the creation of monks. The three
holes represent the Holy Trinity, and the twists of the dough represent the
arms of someone praying. In fact, the word "pretzel" is a German word deriving
ultimately from the Latin "bracellae," meaning "little arms" (the Vatican
has the oldest known representation of a pretzel, found on a 5th c. manuscript).
Below is a recipe for the large, soft, chewy pretzels that go so well with
beer:
Soft Pretzels
(makes 12)
1 (.25 ounces) package active dry yeast
2 Tablespoons brown sugar
1 1/8 teaspoons salt
1 1/2 cups warm water (110 degrees F)
3 cups all-purpose flour
1 cup bread flour
2 cups warm water (110 degrees F)
1 Tablespoons baking soda dissolved in 6 qt. water in large pot
egg + water for eggwash
2 Tablespoons butter, melted
2 Tablespoons coarse pretzel salt or kosher salt
In a large mixing bowl, dissolve the yeast, brown sugar and salt in 1 1/2
cups warm water. Stir in flour, and knead dough on a floured surface until
smooth and elastic, about 8 minutes. Place in a greased bowl, and turn to
coat the surface. Cover, and let rise for one hour.
Meanwhile, place parchment on cookie sheets and oil paper.
After dough has risen, cut into 12 pieces. Roll each piece into a 2 to 3
foot, finger-thick rope. With the rope, make a U, cross the ends, twist,
and attach to the center of the bottom of the U. Place on the parchment-lined
sheets and let rise, uncovered, 15 to 20 minutes. While they are rising,
bring the baking soda + water in the pot to a boil. When the pretzels are
risen, boil the pretzels in the water for about 3 minutes, turning once,
til puffed a bit. Place on sheets and brush with eggwash.
Bake at 450 degrees F for 8 to 10 minutes, or until golden brown. Brush with
melted butter, and sprinkle with coarse salt (can use garlic salt or cinnamon
sugar instead).
Hot Cross Buns
are eaten at breakfast on Good Friday, and
there are other special foods eaten on certain days, but you can read about
these on the pages dedicated to those dates.
Note: Lent is a good time to start considering any plans you might have for
a Mary Garden. Depending on where you live,
planting time is approaching! The days of Lenten
Embertide are most apt for planning such an endeavor.
Reading
"The Mystery
of Lent"
from Dom Gueranger's "The Liturgical Year"
We may be sure
that a season so sacred as this of Lent is rich in mysteries. The Church
has made it a time of recollection and penance, in preparation for the greatest
of all her feasts; she would, therefore, bring into it everything that could
excite the faith of her children, and encourage them to go through the arduous
work of atonement for their sins. During Septuagesima, we had the number
"seventy", which reminds us of those seventy years of captivity in Babylon,
after which God's chosen people, being purified from idolatry, was to return
to Jerusalem and celebrate the Pasch. It is the number "forty" that the Church
now brings before us: a number, as St. Jerome observes, which denotes punishment
and affliction.
Let us remember the forty days and forty nights of the deluge sent by God
in His anger, when He repented that He had made man, and destroyed the whole
human race with the exception of one family. Let us consider how the Hebrew
people, in punishment for their ingratitude, wandered forty years in the
desert, before they were permitted to enter the promised land. Let us listen
to our God commanding the Prophet Ezechiel to lie forty days on his right
side, as a figure of the siege which was to bring destruction on Jerusalem.
There are two persons in the old Testament who represent the two manifestations
of God: Moses, who typifies the Law; and Elias, who is the figure of the
Prophets. Both of these are permitted to approach God: the first on Sinai,
the second on Horeb; but both of them have to prepare for the great favour
by an expiatory fast of forty days.
With these mysterious facts before us, we can understand why it is that the
Son of God, having become Man for our salvation and wishing to subject Himself
to the pain of fasting, chose the number of forty days. The institution of
Lent is thus brought before us with everything that can impress the mind
with its solemn character, and with its power of appeasing God and purifying
our souls. Let us, therefore, look beyond the little world which surrounds
us, and see how the whole Christian universe is, at this very time, offering
this forty days' penance as a sacrifice of propitiation to the offended Majesty
of God; and let us hope that, as in the case of the Ninivites, He will mercifully
accept this year's offering of our atonement, and pardon us our sins.
The number of our days of Lent is, then, a holy mystery: let us now learn,
from the liturgy, in what light the Church views her children during these
forty days. She considers them as an immense army, fighting day and night
against their spiritual enemies. We remember how, on Ash Wednesday, she calls
Lent a Christian warfare. In order that we may have that newness of life,
which will make us worthy to sing once more our "Alleluia", we must conquer
our three enemies: the devil, the flesh, and the world. We are fellow combatants
with our Jesus, for He, too, submits to the triple temptation, suggested
to Him by satan in person. Therefore, we must have on our armour, and watch
unceasingly. And whereas it is of the utmost importance that our hearts be
spirited and brave, the Church gives us a war-song of heaven's own making,
which can fire even cowards with hope of victory and confidence in God's
help: it is the ninetieth Psalm. She inserts the whole of it in the Mass
of the first Sunday of Lent, and every day introduces several of its verses
into the ferial Office.
She there tells us to rely on the protection, wherewith our heavenly Father
covers us, as with a shield; to hope under the shelter of His wings; to have
confidence in Him; for that He will deliver us from the snare of the hunter,
who had robbed us of the holy liberty of the children of God; to rely upon
the succour of the holy angels, who are our brothers, to whom our Lord hath
given charge that they keep us in all our ways, and who, when Jesus permitted
satan to tempt Him, were the adoring witnesses of His combat, and approached
Him, after His victory, proffering to Him their service and homage. Let us
well absorb these sentiments wherewith the Church would have us to be inspired;
and, during our six weeks' campaign, let us often repeat this admirable canticle,
which so fully describes what the soldiers of Christ should be and feel in
this season of the great spiritual warfare.
But the Church is not satisfied with thus animating us to the contest with
our enemies: she would also have our minds engrossed with thoughts of deepest
import; and for this end she puts before us three great subjects, which she
will gradually enfold to us between this and the great Easter solemnity.
Let us be all attention to these soul-stirring and instructive lessons.
And firstly, there is the conspiracy of the Jews against our Redeemer. It
will be brought before us in its whole history, from its first formation
to its final consummation on the great Friday, when we shall behold the Son
of God hanging on the wood of the cross. The infamous workings of the Synagogue
will be brought before us so regularly, that we shall be able to follow the
plot in all its details. We shall be inflamed with love for the august Victim,
whose meekness, wisdom, and dignity bespeak a God. The divine drama, which
began in the cave of Bethlehem, is to close on Calvary, we may assist at
it, by meditating on the passages of the Gospel read to us by the Church
during these days of Lent.
The second of the subjects offered to us, for our instruction, requires that
we should remember how the feast of Easter is to be the day of new birth
for our catechumens, and how, in the early ages of the Church, Lent was the
immediate and solemn preparation given to the candidates for Baptism. The
holy liturgy of the present season retains much of the instruction she used
to give to the catechumens; and as we listen to her magnificent lessons from
both the old and the new Testament, whereby she completed their "initiation",
we ought to think with gratitude of how we were not required to wait years
before being made children of God, but were mercifully admitted to Baptism
even in our infancy. We shall be led to pray for those new catechumens, who
this very year, in far distant countries, are receiving instructions from
their zealous missioners, and are looking forward, as did the postulants
of the primitive Church, to that grand feast of our Saviour's victory over
death, when they are to be cleansed in the waters of Baptism and receive
from the contact a new being-regeneration.
Thirdly, we must remember how, formerly, the public penitents, who had been
separated on Ash Wednesday from the assembly of the faithful, were the object
of the Church's maternal solicitude during the whole forty days of Lent,
and were to be admitted to reconciliation on Maundy Thursday, if their repentance
were such as to merit this public forgiveness. We shall have the admirable
course of instructions, which were originally designed for these penitents,
and which the liturgy, faithful as it ever is to such traditions, still retains
for our sake. As we read these sublime passages of the Scripture, we shall
naturally think upon our own sins, and on what easy terms they were pardoned
us; whereas, had we lived in other times, we should have probably been put
through the ordeal of a public and severe penance. This will excite us to
fervour, for we shall remember that, whatever changes the indulgence of the
Church may lead her to make in her discipline, the justice of our God is
ever the same. We shall find in all this an additional motive for offering
to His divine Majesty the sacrifice of a contrite heart and we shall go through
our penances with that cheerful eagerness, which the conviction of our deserving
much severer ones always brings with it.
In order to keep up the character of mournfulness and austerity which is
so well suited to Lent, the Church, for many centuries, admitted very few
feasts into this portion of her year, inasmuch as there is always joy where
there is even a spiritual feast. In the fourth century, we have the Council
of Laodicea forbidding, in its fifty-first canon, the keeping of a feast
or commemoration of any saint during Lent, excepting on the Saturdays or
Sundays. The Greek Church rigidly maintained this point of lenten discipline;
nor was it till many centuries after the Council of Laodicea that she made
an exception for March 25, on which day she now keeps the feast of our Lady's
Annunciation.
The Church of Rome maintained this same discipline, at least in principle;
but she admitted the feast of the Annunciation at a very early period, and
somewhat later, the feast of the apostle St. Mathias, on February 24. During
the last few centuries, she has admitted several other feasts into that portion
of her general calendar which coincides with Lent; still, she observes a
certain restriction, out of respect for the ancient practice.
The reason why the Church of Rome is less severe on this point of excluding
the saints' feasts during Lent, is that the Christians of the west have never
looked upon the celebration of a feast as incompatible with fasting; the
Greeks, on the contrary, believe that the two are irreconcilable, and as
a consequence of this principle, never observe Saturday as a fasting-day,
because they always keep it as a solemnity, though they make Holy Saturday
an exception, and fast upon it. For the same reason, they do not fast upon
the Annunciation.
This strange idea gave rise, in or about the seventh century, to a custom
which is peculiar to the Greek Church. It is called the "Mass of the
Presanctified", that is to say, consecrated in a previous Sacrifice. On each
Sunday of Lent, the priest consecrates six Hosts, one of which he receives
in that Mass; but the remaining five are reserved for a simple Communion,
which is made on each of the five following days, without the holy Sacrifice
being offered. The Latin Church practices this rite only once in the year,
that is, on Good Friday, and this in commemoration of a sublime mystery,
which we will explain in its proper place.
This custom of the Greek Church was evidently suggested by the forty-ninth
canon of the Council of Laodicea, which forbids the offering of bread for
the Sacrifice during Lent, excepting on the Saturdays and Sundays. The Greeks,
some centuries later on, concluded from this canon that the celebration of
the holy Sacrifice was incompatible with fasting; and we learn from the
controversy they had, in the ninth century, with the legate Humbert, that
the "Mass of the Presanctified" (which has no other authority to rest on
save a canon of the famous Council in "Trullo", held in 692) was justified
by the Greeks on this absurd plea, that the Communion of the Body and Blood
of our Lord broke the lenten fast.
The Greeks celebrate this rite in the evening, after Vespers, and the priest
alone communicates, as is done now in the Roman liturgy on Good Friday. But
for many centuries they have made an exception for the Annunciation; they
interrupt the lenten fast on this feast, they celebrate Mass, and the faithful
are allowed to receive holy Communion.
The canon of the Council of Laodicea was probably never received in the western
Church. If the suspension of the holy Sacrifice during Lent was ever practiced
in Rome, it was only on the Thursdays; and even that custom was abandoned
in the eighth century, as we learn from Anastasius the Librarian, who tells
us that Pope St. Gregory II., desiring to complete the Roman sacramentary,
added Masses for the Thursdays of the first five weeks of Lent. It is difficult
to assign the reason of this interruption of the Mass on Thursdays in the
Roman Church, or of the like custom observed by the Church of Milan on the
Fridays of Lent. The explanations we have found in different authors are
not satisfactory. As far as Milan is concerned, we are inclined to think
that, not satisfied with the mere adoption of the Roman usage of not celebrating
Mass on Good Friday, the Ambrosian Church extended the rite to all the Fridays
of Lent.
After thus briefly alluding to these details, we must close our present chapter
by a few words on the holy rites which are now observed, during Lent, in
our western Churches. We have explained several of these in our 'Septuagesima.'
The suspension of the "Alleluia"; the purple vestments; the laying aside
of the deacon's dalmatic, and the subdeacon's tunic; the omission of the
two joyful canticles "Gloria in excelsis" and "Te Deum"; the substitution
of the mournful "Tract" for the Alleluia-verse in the Mass; the "Benedicamus
Domino" instead of the "Ite Missa est"; the additional prayer said over the
people after the Postcommunions on ferial days; the celebration of the Vesper
Office before midday, excepting on the Sundays: all these are familiar to
our readers. We have now only to mention, in addition, the genuflections
prescribed for the conclusion of all the Hours of the Divine Office on ferias,
and the rubric which bids the choir to kneel, on those same days, during
the Canon of the Mass.
There were other ceremonies peculiar to the season of Lent, which were observed
in the Churches of the west, but which have now, for many centuries, fallen
into general disuse; we say general, because they are still partially kept
up in some places. Of these rites, the most imposing was that of putting
up a large veil between the choir and the altar, so that neither clergy nor
people could look upon the holy mysteries celebrated within the sanctuary.
This veil-which was called "the Curtain", and, generally speaking, was of
a purple colour-was a symbol of the penance to which the sinner ought to
subject himself, in order to merit the sight of that divine Majesty, before
whose face he had committed so many outrages. It signified, moreover, the
humiliations endured by our Redeemer, who was a stumbling-block to the proud
Synagogue. But as a veil that is suddenly drawn aside, these humiliations
were to give way, and be changed into the glories of the Resurrection. Among
other places where this rite is still observed, we may mention the metropolitan
church of Paris, "Notre Dame."
It was the custom also, in many churches, to veil the crucifix and the statues
of the saints as soon as Lent began; in order to excite the faithful to a
livelier sense of penance, they were deprived of the consolation which the
sight of these holy images always brings to the soul. But this custom, which
is still retained in some places, was less general than the more expressive
one used in the Roman Church, which we will explain in our next volume-the
veiling of the crucifix and statues only in Passiontide.
We learn from the ceremonials of the middle ages that, during Lent, and
particularly on the Wednesdays and Fridays, processions used frequently to
be made from one church to another. In monasteries, these processions were
made in the cloister, and barefooted. This custom was suggested by the practice
of Rome, where there is a "Station" for every day of Lent which, for many
centuries, began by a procession to the stational church.
Lastly, the Church has always been in the habit of adding to her prayers
during the season of Lent. Her discipline was, until recently, that, on ferias,
in cathedral and collegiate churches which were not exempted by a custom
to the contrary, the following additions were made to the canonical Hours:
on Monday, the Office of the Dead; on Wednesday, the Gradual Psalms; and
on Friday, the Penitential Psalms. In some churches, during the middle ages,
the whole Psalter was added each week of Lent to the usual Office.
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