I’m deeply interested in the “spiritual life,” but I’m not a religious person. My spirit prefers not to be housed in any single wisdom tradition.
Still, every year I walk through Lent on the Christian calendar with fervent gratitude. Why? Because, in 1999, I lived the forty-seven days of Lent and Holy Week on the streets of Columbus, Ohio—the city where I resided at the time.
I went without a home by choice, accompanied by my dear friend James Murray. Our intention in going to the streets was simply to be present there, offering what compassionate attention we could to whomever we met.
James and I eventually chronicled our experiences in The Emptiness of Our Hands. To this day, each of us regards our life on the streets as profoundly transformative. Unforgettable.
This year’s Lenten season began last Wednesday. On February 14. Valentine’s Day.
Today, I invite you to share this moment from my first Lenten Sunday on the streets. James and I had left our homes less than a week before.
As you encounter this text—an excerpt from The Emptiness of Our Hands—please lay aside any religious or other difference that you might feel rising up between you and me. Just let the words be. Receive them as part of my life story. They come from my true spot.
One last thing before you read . . . The person in that photo at the top of this post is me. James took the photo as I sat on the steps of St. Joseph Cathedral; he shot it with a pinhole camera he’d constructed from trash. The swirls of light around me are parishioners leaving mass during the long photographic exposure.
SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 21, 1999
Indulgence
8 am mass at St. Joseph Cathedral. We’ve come here because we have nowhere else to go. This being Sunday morning, public buildings in the downtown are generally closed, at least till noon, and the weather’s too nasty to remain outside.
We’ve come here too because this elegant cathedral, the seat of the Columbus diocese, is filling with people—people wishing not only to worship, but also to be together, acknowledging the higher, the truer, the loving, the just. Like them, James and I want to commune. We want not to be alone.
We can also indulge our senses here. There’ll be gold metalwork gleaming with light, and candles glimmering in hidden drafts of air. There’ll be colorful liturgical cloths and garments appropriate to the season. There’ll be music—pipe organ and choir, hymns and chants soaring to the vaulted ceiling, then drifting as echoes into silence. Quite possibly, there’ll be incense burning; if not that, then the mingling of perfumes and colognes. There’ll be prayers as we kneel on soft cushions, and the barest taste of bread and wine.
At the Passing of the Peace, congregants stand to greet those sitting around them, blessing them, wishing them well. The older white man directly in front of me, wearing an expensive suit, casually turns around to shake hands. When he sees me, shock registers on his face. I smile and grip his hand hard.
James and I would both like to be more presentable, this first Sunday of Lent. Back when we were kids, the dress code for church services was strict: for James, a collared shirt and dress pants; for me, my best dress and shoes. Proper attire was a way of showing respect, though to whom, God or neighbor, was never clear. It was simply a necessary part of the ritual: good clothes, like good music, made for good worship. Those memories of religion in childhood remain strong, even after all these years.
Today our clothes are dumpy, dirty, sweaty, infested with fuzz balls. Both of us, upon arriving, had peeled off a few layers, hoping for a less nappy look, but with each garment we removed, our body odor intensified. Fuzz and dirt, we decided, was better.
The priest’s homily is based on Jesus’s testing by Satan in the wilderness. He describes Lent as a time when we must face and overcome our temptations, especially through the practice of fasting. In his view, fasting is a temporary sacrifice of excess. For a period of forty days, we give up something we possess too much of, or do too often. What happens after the forty days are up, well, the priest doesn’t say.
This interpretation of fasting, depending as it does on excess, strikes me as privileged. It tends to exclude those who have little while easing the conscience of those who have much. What if fasting, instead of being a temporary modification of lifestyle for the relatively well to do, were a deliberate change of heart undertaken by us all? What if it were less about giving up red meat or cigarettes or clothes-shopping for a few weeks, and more about giving up, bit by bit, our rigid expectations of what the future should hold, our fixed assumptions about how the world should operate, our categorical judgments of how people should act and who they should be? Considered this way, fasting isn’t a privileged practice—all of us can do it. Nor is it restricted to a certain season of the year, but instead is a daily challenge.
The point in fasting isn’t for us to become perfect, beyond reproach, but simply to exercise faith, opening our minds and hearts as best we’re able and learning from our mistakes. Over a lifetime of practice, something might rise up in place of the fear or greed or ignorance we’ve fasted away—something we’ve helped bring about but can’t take credit for. Maybe our joy is fuller, our compassion wiser, our kindness quicker, our patience longer, our suffering more humble, our determination to respond to the suffering of others deeper and more enduring,
James goes forward for bread and wine, welcome as a Catholic to partake. When he returns, he opens his hand to reveal a communion wafer. Breaking it in two, he passes half to me, and together we consume the host. A sense of belonging, born from a simple gesture.
The man who had earlier passed me the peace returns from the front of the nave still chewing his wafer. Spurning his original seat, he takes another, several pews further up the aisle.
The Gentle Nudge
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Thank you for sharing this lovely piece. Raised in the Episcopal church, I decided not to participate in confirmation as a teen because I had deep questions about God and didn't feel I could take oaths or spout beliefs that weren't fully mine. Thus I was not allowed to take communion. Years later, in a Moravian church on a glorious spring day I was invited to participate and did. The sense of community and oneness with something greater than myself was profound. Now, at 66, I still do not belong to any organized religion but feel a strong connection with Creator and strive to see the divinity in everything and everyone, especially those less fortunate than myself.
The photograph with it's shimmers of light, the fast moving people and the long exposure of the pinhole camera, reminded me that we are all light but unless we take a long enough exposure, we often don't see it.
Oh Phyllis this statement alone should be spoken in every pulpit and other places throughout Lent.
"What if it were less about giving up red meat or cigarettes or clothes-shopping for a few weeks, and more about giving up, bit by bit, our rigid expectations of what the future should hold, our fixed assumptions about how the world should operate, our categorical judgments of how people should act and who they should be? Considered this way, fasting isn’t a privileged practice—all of us can do it. Nor is it restricted to a certain season of the year, but instead is a daily challenge." As one who loves the Lenten season I can't thank you enough for this. It helps give me new focus for the season. One other thing to share...tears came into my eyes when you said the man moved up a few pews. Isn't it so sad that he missed the opportunity to be kind and loving. Big hugs to you for sharing this, for having the courage to do this and for just being you.