Entering Lent: A Season of Repentance, Baptism and Hope

By Tish O’Hagan

Worship Director

Diocese of Boise

The Church has two liturgical seasons whose main purpose is to prepare us for our great feast days — Christmas and Easter — and both seasons have a twofold nature. Advent is both eschatological (looking forward to the end times) and rooted in the coming celebration of the birth of Christ (looking backward to, and celebrating, a profound event in the history of salvation).

Lent, the season we are about to enter, is a season of repentance and baptism:

“…the Lenten liturgy prepares for celebration of the Paschal Mystery both catechumens, by the various stages of Christian initiation, and the faithful, who recall their own Baptism and do penance” (Universal Norms on the Liturgical Year and the Calendar, No. 27).

In keeping with the emphasis on penance, during Lent the Church is vested in purple. Music is muted, and there should be no flowers in the sanctuary (nor any other unnecessary decor, such as elaborate displays meant to represent a “desert” time of the soul). At Mass, there is no Gloria, and the Alleluia is not sung or said.

Nonetheless, Lent is at its root an optimistic season (the word Lent comes from an old Anglo-Saxon word for springtime, the most optimistic time of year). For those anticipating baptism at Easter, Lent is the initiation period into a life of grace as a Christian.

Meanwhile, we, the already baptized, are called to deepen our commitment to this life of grace through acts of charity and atonement that hopefully reflect more than surface asceticism. These acts acknowledge a collaboration with God that began with our own baptism, a collaboration in which we willingly take on the aspects and obligations of Christian life that are clearly delineated in the Gospels.

Lenten liturgies are also a communal summons to enter this collaboration. We celebrate the scrutinies along with those about to be baptized. The readings on the Sundays of Lent speak of transformation, resurrection and the complicated history of God’s relationship with his children. We fast and pray, spiritually accompanying the catechumens as they prepare to become new creations in Christ.

 Lent’s twofold nature springs from our fallen human nature — born to sin and repent, to be saved and exalt. Through our participation in the Paschal mystery, in our observance of the rites and character of this liturgical season, and in our accompaniment of the catechumenate, we encounter the ever-unfolding, ongoing Christian story.

Our Lenten liturgies acknowledge in a particular way that our salvation is rooted in the mercy of God, whose abundant love provides the reparation we ourselves cannot provide. We recognize that we have entered into divine life with God, and we pray for those about to undergo that same transformation at Easter. We see that this new life springs into being not in isolation, but in the body of Christ, which is the Church.

 Lenten Observances and Guidelines

Lent begins Feb. 18, on Ash Wednesday, and runs until the Mass of the Lord’s Supper on Holy Thursday (April 2).

The faithful support those preparing for baptism at Easter and undergo their own conversion process through the three spiritual disciplines of Lent: penance, almsgiving and prayer. Catholics are encouraged to observe the season by attending Lenten services such as the Stations of the Cross; by “fasting from” particular habits and indulgences; by cultivating additional practices of prayer and service; and by being deliberate in their almsgiving. It is also recommended that Catholics receive the sacrament of reconciliation before Easter.

• Ash Wednesday and Good Friday are obligatory days of fasting and abstinence for Catholics. In addition, Fridays during Lent are obligatory days of abstinence.

• For members of the Latin Catholic Church, the norms on fasting are obligatory from age 18 through age 59. When fasting, a person is permitted to eat one full meal, as well as two smaller meals that together do not equal a full meal. The norms concerning abstinence from meat are binding on members of the Latin Catholic Church from age 14 onward.

• If possible, the fast on Good Friday is continued until the Easter Vigil (on Holy Saturday night) as the “paschal fast,” to honor the suffering and death of the Lord Jesus and to prepare to share more fully in the celebration of his resurrection.

• Those excused from fasting and abstinence outside the age limits include the physically or mentally ill, including individuals suffering from chronic illnesses such as diabetes, as well as pregnant or nursing women. In all cases, common sense should prevail, and ill persons should not further jeopardize their health by fasting.