A Letter from the Rector - Epiphany and Lent 2007

My dear friends,

In our culture, when we want to suggest a large number, we say there were a “hundred” deer in my back yard, or “hundreds” of people at some event, or “hundreds and hundreds” of seagulls on the Goldstream river. For the people of Jesus' time, the equivalent was to speak in “forties”. So the great flood lasted forty days, the Israelites spent forty years in the wilderness, and Jesus spent forty days being tempted. If the stories had said that the flood lasted a hundred days, the Israelites spent a hundred years in the wilderness, and that Jesus was tempted for a hundred days, we would catch the original meaning.

We are about to start Lent, our “hundred days” of preparation for Easter. Since Easter is about God's victory over all kinds of evil and destruction, Lent has traditionally been a time to practice entering into that victory with special depth. There have traditionally been three ways of doing that.

Firstly, since it is our attempts to make ourself the centre of everything that cause so much grief to others and for our world, we have traditionally given up something for Lent. It can be as small as sugar in coffee or, for some, marmalade on toast. But such a small thing, denied for no purpose other than refusing to always be satisfied, reminds us on a daily basis that we are not the centre of all things. We can then be open to an awareness that deeper satisfaction is offered daily by God. It's amazing the freedom one then experiences – because one's priorities are being aligned to whom we really are, and away from our desire to be God. At the Shrove Tuesday supper on February 20th we symbolically have our last fling, eat the last of the sweet foods, and dance for the last time. Not because there's anything wrong with those things, but in order that for a “hundred days” we discover that there is so much more to us than seeking our own pleasure. Then, when our true self has been raised at Easter, we can enter into the delights God has in store for us in full enjoyment without the enslaved addiction to possessions and power which undermines our true self so easily. It's not about how much we give up; it's about how much we are liberated from enslavement to our false self.

Secondly, Lent has traditionally been a time for deepening our deepest parts. We humans were created to appreciate, to understand, to know. That's why relationships are so satisfying – to know and to be known, to understand and to be understood, to appreciate and to be appreciated. That's when we feel fully alive. We can see early signs of such knowledge in the animals, and particularly in our pets, but people were created to experience that mutual knowledge at a profound level. So Lent may be a time to prepare for resurrection in your most important relationship, or resurrection in your connections with the wider community, or resurrection in your own sense of who you are.

All those kinds of mutual knowledge are under-girded by God's knowledge of us and our response. So Lent has traditionally been a time to deepen those experiences of God. There will be a pre-Lent lay retreat with Brother Clark, the Noon Forum speakers on “God, Climate Change and Us”, evenings with Brother Clark about Anglican Franciscan spirituality and about the practice of the labyrinth, a series on the environment and spirituality “Reflections on Global Warming – action through faith” with a special public event at First Metropolitan United on Monday, February 12th, a series on Borg and Crossan’s book “The Last Week”, an inter-generational weekend at Camp Columbia on Thetis Island, called “God's footprint? Our footprint?”, and the Friday evening Lenten recital series – all will provide opportunities for deepening our knowledge of God's knowledge of us.

The third way of entering on the journey to receiving our full selves from God is that of service to others. In this regard, you will be interested to learn that St. John’s has been awarded a Community Service award by the Victoria Police for the night shelter in the fall. Some of us will find ways of making special time available perhaps in the food bank, perhaps in encouraging more just policies through letter writing to governments, perhaps through particular contributions to outreach through the blue envelopes or the Primate's World Relief and Development Fund or perhaps through self-sacrificial care for God's glorious creation through new priorities in what we eat and how we live. Seen through the lens of self-absorption such actions seem like burdens. Seen through the lens of God's Easter triumph they become for us the way of being more alive than ever before.

So, strangely enough, the traditional Lenten forty days of fasting and study can become for us a “hundred days” of riches! Be sure to take advantage of these opportunities, and the special liturgies, so that as we enter upon the joys of Easter and our full incorporation into all that we were made to be, we will receive all that God has in store for us.

You will find details of the events I have mentioned in the attached calendar. In addition, you might want to make note of the following special events after Easter:

• Preparation led by the clergy from Easter until Pentecost for adults wishing baptism, confirmation, or re-affirmation of vows, or “reception” into the Anglican church (from a tradition in which they have already been confirmed). Please let the clergy know if you are interested.
• A “special” service celebrating the gift of the Spirit at Pentecost at 10:30 June 3rd
• Bishop James Cowan will preside at Eucharist and confirmation Sunday, June 10th.

With my wishes for a very blessed forty days,

Harold Munn

The Rev. Canon Dr. Harold Munn

Rector