"Doing" Lent...

Are you like me this far into Lent? Remember all the things you thought
you wanted to take on or "do" this Lent? Here I find myself well into this Lent
and all the things I had hoped to take on or "do" have been left to the side
of every day existence and the busyness we create in our daily lives.

I ask myself - why have I done this again? Is this a Lenten block I have
over zealously created? Do I, or maybe the question is, can/could/would I
"do" Lent in a way I think personal discipline and faith call me to do?
Or am I just unable or perhaps more truthfully, not willing to take it
full on. Oh, the reading I planned to do, the meditation time I wanted to
set aside, even a little prayer time I wanted to create and explore.

So here I am in mid-Lent just bumbling along and full of questions and
far removed from my planned disciplines, again. Perhaps I have an
unacknowledged fear of what I might find or even more to the point,
what I most likely would not find. I know I am not alone in this. And perhaps
I am more willing to admit this than others. That might be a piece of the
truth I am seeking. I don't feel guilty, I don't feel any sense of a failure;
I just feel unable to commit to a discipline that might engender new
awakenings and deeper commitments. Maybe.

I shall persevere. I look forward to all of Holy Week and the Great Vigil of
Easter and then the ice cream of Easter Morning. But the forty days
keep eluding me.

The big maybe is that perhaps next year.......maybe.


R