March 11, 2009 – Columbus, Ohio

I don’t know about the rest of you, but I’m beginning to enjoy reading this StAR blog.  One of the themes you can pick up by perusing the posts is the struggles we all have with Lent – all of these devout Catholic intellectuals having trouble fasting from Graham Crackers!

It reminds me of a triolet I once wrote:

Have mercy on me, Lord, a sinner,
My Lenten vows I’m not observing.
I say this grace tonight at dinner,
“Have mercy on me, Lord, a sinner!”
I break my fast and grow no thinner
For I have had a second serving.
Have mercy on me, Lord, a sinner,
My Lenten vows I’m not observing.

Last night the troupe and I performed at a beautiful old church in Washington Courthouse, Ohio, St. Colman’s.  The church was completed on September 7, 1885, and destroyed by a tornado on September 8, 1885 – the only surviving portion being the beautiful spire, which still stands, the destroyed church having been rebuilt around it.

The space had its share of “gremlins”, and it took me over an hour to set up the sound system, which kept giving us mysterious moments of feedback and squawking.  The audience even began to show up as I was struggling, a microphone attached to my person, tempted again and again to utter words that should not be uttered, especially in church, and especially with a microphone on in front of a Catholic audience.

Part of my Lenten fast is to try to break the habit of cursing, a habit I picked up in my secular days, and one that is, like all sinful habits, very hard to break.  I was able to refrain with the microphone on in front of the audience, and so I thought later that a good penance would be to wear a microphone at all times, which would make me much more conscious of trying to avoid such sin!

We are such slaves to sin and to silly addictions.  Struggling with Lent at the very least humbles us and shows us how dependent we are on the grace of God for any true reform in our lives.  For as a I posted yesterday, what we say and do springs forth from who we are, and who we are can only be remade in Christ, “by the washing of regeneration”.  (Titus 3:5)