Hitting the mark

Very recently we entered the liturgical season of Lent. Announced more through the marking of pancake Tuesday than the re-marking on Ash Wednesday, and the prevalence of bunnies in wrappers in supermarkets.

I thought I might dwell on the season for a moment or two.

Traditionally associated with the privation of something, the better to mark our reliance on the divine and acknowledge our shortcomings; Lent is the precursor to the main Christian celebrations of Easter. Noting our shortcomings is interesting. The earliest notions of this idea expressed themselves in the Greek hamartia (ἁμαρτία) ‘missing the mark’. The ancients had a concept of appropriate behaviours which if deviated from was to miss the mark. These behaviours are the substance of your being yourself. In this they are intimately connected with notions of Truth and thereby of Beauty also. Reader you may want to flick back to previous musings to pick up that thread. 

Taking time to be introspective is a good thing, if and only if we do not become self-absorbed and what arises from the introspection is challenging us to be a better version of ourselves. If it is less than this, it tends to the self-pity that suggests the world owes us a living. Properly managed, the tradition of thoughtful reasoned introspection within the Christian tradition has equivalence with all of the other religious traditions. It seems then that it is a human attribute.

I wonder if over the 40 days of Lent that we might find time to really think clearly and thoughtfully about our motivations. The opportunity to take stock of what we are about and how we go about our business is worthwhile. But I wonder if there might also be some resolve to take up an action that influences only others and affects their experience of the world. It moves away from the ‘me’ centrism that parades itself as meaningful authenticity. 

The Lenten focus is ostensibly on the ‘mea culpas’, but couldn’t it just as reasonably and helpfully be on finding opportunity to reconcile with others. The distribution of justice that starts with forgiving those who may have slighted us or asking for that forgiveness as the crossing of our own Rubicon toward redemption. The ultimate Redemptive act realised on Easter Sunday could be realised personally and relationally by us all if we take the chance and those chances pop up every day.

The keyboard warrior might sheath their weapon and consider the human being on the other end. The media story might be shared if it is genuinely social and then liked and reshared only if it edifies. Stories never lose in the retelling and there has never been a time of greater social and personal dislocation, but we don’t connect without a two-way process. We take time with the children to do this and to allow accountability to be transformational. The redemptive act needs a moment of enlightenment wherein those to be transformed recognise that what they did missed the mark. There is also a need to make amends. Talk is cheap, if bridges are to be built then there is a degree of effort to be expended that not only shows willing but contrition. It may all sound a little old fashioned, but it is not untrue.

We all make choices; we get some stuff wrong; we are all human. If we carry the mark of Cain it is because we miss the mark, we may not mean it but we do. There is no need to be tolerant of this nor accepting of it. To do so would be to settle for imperfection and not to mind that mistakes are made and feelings hurt. It is quite wrong to preach ‘resilience’ as you might see in much that abounds as advice. If resilience is understood as putting up with things, it is not a virtue, it may even mark the lack of it. I would suggest we preach resolve. The resolve to be better, to the relentless and restless pursuit of being a better version of ourselves. I don’t want the resilience to put up with the state of affairs, I want the resolve to make a difference. Having the humility to be contrite, the courage to forgive and the wisdom to make the world a better place seems to hit the mark?