Daniel 13:1-9, 15-17, 19-30, 33-62
John 8:1-11
Alexander Schmemann has written that, “Instead of asking fundamental questions--'What is fasting?' or 'What is Lent?'--we satisfy ourselves with lenten symbolism.
“In church magazines and bulletins appear recipes for 'delicious lenten dishes,' and a parish might even raise some additional money by means of a well-advertised 'tasty lenten dinner.'
“So much in our churches is explained symbolically as interesting, colorful, and amusing customs and traditions, as something which connects us not so much with God and a new life in God but with the past and the customs of our ancestors, that it becomes increasingly difficult to discern behind this religious folklore the utter seriousness of religion.
“Let me stress that there is nothing wrong in the various customs themselves. When they appeared they were the means and the expressions of a society taking religion seriously; they were not symbols, but life itself.
“What happened, however, was that as life changed and became less and less shaped by religion in its totality, a few customs survived as symbols of a way of life no longer lived.
“And what survived was that which on the one hand is most colorful and on the other hand the least difficult.
“The spiritual danger here is that little by little one begins to understand religion itself as a system of symbols and customs rather than to understand the latter as a challenge to spiritual renewal and effort.
“More effort goes into preparing lenten dishes or Easter baskets than into fasting and participation in the spiritual reality of Easter.
“This means that as long as customs and traditions are not connected again with the total religious world view which produced them, as long as symbols are not taken seriously, the church will remain disconnected from life and have no power over life.
"Instead of symbolizing our 'rich heritage,' we must start integrating it into our real life.”
Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote:
“It is not some religious act which makes a Christian what he or she is, but participation in the suffering of God in the life of the world. This is metanoia. This being caught up into the messianic suffering of God in Jesus Christ takes a variety of forms in the New Testament.
“It appears in the call to discipleship, in Jesus' table fellowship with sinners, in conversions in the narrower sense of the word, in the act of the woman who was a sinner, an act which she performed without any specific confession of sin, in the healing of the sick, in Jesus' acceptance of children.
“The centurion of Capernaum (who does not make any confession of sin) is held up by Jesus as a model of faith. There is nothing of religious asceticism here. The religious act is always something partial; faith is always something whole, an act involving the whole life.
"Jesus does not call us to a new religion but to a new life.”
Posted by John
at 12:01 AM CDT
Updated: Thursday, February 15, 2007 1:58 AM CST
