This year for Lent, the St. A’s community will participate in two daily devotional practices. The first is from the Society of St. John the Evangelist (SSJE), the monastery at which I spent a year in 2011-2012, and from Episcopal Migration Ministries (EMM), the refugee welcome and resettlement arm of the Episcopal Church. Our practices will begin next Wednesday on Ash Wednesday.
From SSJE, we will be using their Signs of Life daily practice devotional. It works in two ways. First, each day of the week we practice a different aspect of the Way of Love rule of life: worship, pray, learn, turn, bless, go, and rest. Each week also has a different focus: light, water, food, shelter, and community. Every day at 8 AM from Ash Wednesday through 4 April (that’s the day before Holy Week begins), we will publish on the blog that day’s practice. They are every day kinds of practices that will help cultivate your faith as a way of life, not just a list of truth-claims to be assented to.
The second practice is to listen to the EMM “Way of the Cross” podcast series. Each Wednesday and daily during Holy Week, EMM will publish a podcast reflecting on the Way of the Cross. We will publish the podcasts in the afternoons.
You don’t have to do it all though! Like any Lenten discipline the point is not to be “perfect” or to be punished when (not if!) you miss or mess up. The point is practice. The only way to become an artist is to practice art; to be a doctor, practice medicine; to be a Christian, practice living and loving like Jesus lived and loved.
You are invited to come along with us on this journey. Whether you are a member of one of our university communities or not, you are one of us because we are all one in Christ. You’re invited. Come and see.
St. Augustine's Chapel 