THOUGHTS OF A MONK

“Spring Training”

March 12, 2006

Christ is in our midst [He is and ever shall be], and isn’t that annoying! Christ, always seems to be coming around to remind us of something we would rather forget. He can be like a fly buzzing around your head on a hot summer day. You just can’t get rid of it. Just when you think it’s gone and some peace has returned to your life, buzzzzzz there it is again! Whap! But off it flies only to return later. In today’s gospel reading Christ gives us the example of fasting and fending off temptations. Oh what, again!

Temptations, what a delicious thought!  And aren’t we lucky to be living in a society where temptations are encouraged. To pursue the various things that we are tempted with daily is the foundation of our consumer-oriented economy. The more you buy the better for the economy. Notice that even those of us who may question the wisdom, or even the morality, of consumerism, lay aside those objections when we want something. Then, all of a sudden, it’s OK.  For example, look at all those stories about new fashions and the newspaper ads for clothes, what a waste, and yet how many of us have closets bursting to the seams with clothes we’ll never wear, and yet won’t give them away to someone who could wear them now. And of course, you can’t have too many books, or CDs, or DVDs, or cooking utensils, or tools, or money, or … well, you fill in the blank.  It’s so easy to be tempted to get more and more.

So, what is the most important thing in my life and how hard will I work; yes even train myself, for it?  Scripture identifies it and calls it the pearl of great price. And how often we conclude that the price is too great. But when we do pay the price for something of value, what a reward.

How great a price does Nick Hetko have to pay to learn to play the piano as well as he does?  The price is a lot of piano lessons accompanied by many hours of practice. And yet sometimes he may get that nagging feeling that practice is getting to be too much.  Maybe he thinks “this time I’ll cut it short.” Ah, but part of the reason for the practice is to be able to get through those times, which will surely come, when we are attacked by the “temptation” to quit.

To train ourselves to live life better is part of what Great Lent is all about. And not every icon of our society runs counter to that idea of training. Take baseball, for example. This is the time of year when baseball players prepare for the new season: It’s called Spring Training. Every baseball fan anticipates this time of year because we know that the regular season is just around the corner and winter is coming to a close. Yet, we may ask, why have spring training? Isn’t it just a waste of time?  Isn’t it just another scam to sell tickets and earn more money for the owners and players? Do they really take it seriously? Just like the rest of us in our own lives, some do take it seriously and some don’t. Watch for the injuries during the year and you may find out what happens when you don’t take it seriously. Spring training is preparation for the season. And the season has an its ultimate prize, the World Series.  Likewise, Great Lent is preparation for the immediate Paschal Feast (Easter) but it is also about preparing for life with its ultimate goal the eternal Paschal Feast: the Kingdom of God. Maybe we should consider changing the name of the fast from Great Lent to Spring Training, I wonder if our attitude towards it might also change.

Today’s Gospel message isn’t just about training or preparation, it’s also about what we do with that training. Christ’s sojourn into the desert was for 40 days. And notice the temptations came after the 40 days. Christ, at this stage in his life, is just about to begin his ministry. The period of fasting and trials is the preparation.  It is the school for life, which is followed immediately by the school of life, and all its temptations. So if you think that doing all that work for 40 days means that it will be smooth sailing at the end since you are now so well trained, think again. The longer you work, the harder it is to keep at it. It’s like dieting; the more you do it the harder it becomes to stay the course. And ultimately, on that 40th day, there comes that luscious dessert that you know you shouldn’t have if you are to keep with your commitment, but – Oh it tastes so good, and then you succumb.

The scripture Christ quotes says human beings do not live by bread alone. We may try to, but in the end that bread fails, because it really doesn’t satisfy the hunger that is gnawing within. The 40-day fast is the time when we resolve to do better and put in the effort to train ourselves to do better. It is when we strive to love God without reservation and show it in our lives. To keep doing good works and sharing our resources, as we are advised to do in the reading from Hebrews.  To put on Christ in all we do. So that at the end of the 40 days, when the temptation comes to undo everything we’ve just worked on, we will be prepared for it.

I recently read a short passage in a spiritual book by Enzo Bianchi, the founder and prior of an ecumenical monastic community in Italy, which I thought shed a refreshing new light on the value of fasting.  He wrote:
“Fasting carries out the basic function of helping us identify what it is that we hunger for, what gives us life, and what nourishes us, so that we can set our different appetites in order in a way that allows what is truly central in our life to remain central.  … When we fast, we learn to recognize and control our many appetites by first controlling our most basic and vital appetite, hunger. We learn to exercise discipline in our relationships with others, with external reality and with God, relationships in which the temptation of voracity is always present. Fasting is a way of disciplining our need and educating our desire. … Fasting is actually the way a Christian confesses faith in the Lord with his or her entire body. It is an antidote to our tendency to reduce the spiritual life to its intellectual dimension, or to confuse the spiritual with the psychological. … Fasting is truly an essential aspect of faith because it leads us to the question, ‘As a Christian, what is it that gives you life?’ ”