Recently, running late for a meeting, I just missed the lights and was stopped from crossing the road. It’s a busy intersection and the light change for pedestrians is slow. And if you don’t walk very briskly to the centre, the pedestrian light to cross the next four lanes will already be turning red. The pressure! And for some reason that morning I became unreasonably impatient about it. And then I gave myself a mental shake. A few minutes in the context of a day – really? It’s so little time! What was going on with me, I wondered. 

I was reminded of a recent holiday day: It was one of those perfect days, sunny, still and just hot enough – the perfect beach strolling day. As I splashed along, some friends walked toward me and we stood chatting in the shallows. I don’t remember what we talked about, but I remember what it was like. The gently lapping water rolling in and then draining away leaving sandy feet. The distinctive smell of salt mixed with SPF. People of all shapes and sizes moving in and out of the water to sounds of gentle happiness. The blue between the sea and the sky is almost indiscernible. And I stood, just a key in my pocket, a hat on my head, gazing at the sea with nowhere to be except just there. It was a gentle still point moment. 

But here’s the thing. Most of us don’t have the opportunity to stand still in the gently lapping water and gaze at a beautiful vista every day! We sit in traffic, stand in queues, and negotiate family life. Many of us are exhausted by 9.00 am! And then we are in a different working world. It can be hard for us to find a still point in the day. 

A ‘still point’ can mean different things depending on the context. It can be used to describe a sense of inner calm, or a metaphorical anchor that can help us navigate the complexities of our lives. For some, this can be achieved through meditation or yoga. For others it may be through a period of sustained silence – both external and internal. And for some, through prayer. 

This memory of being still has stayed with me. And I have been pondering how to carve out moments of stillness in daily life. These little moments when we can just hold space in our hearts and minds to carry whatever is going on. The social researcher Brené Brown notes that ‘Stillness is not about focusing on nothingness; it’s about creating a clearing. It’s opening up an emotionally clutter-free space and allowing ourselves to feel and think and dream and question.’  

And I can’t help but wonder if this is one of the learnings about this Lenten time. This feeling, thinking, dreaming and questioning time about who we are and how we are living with our God. 

We can cultivate a spirit of stillness that can help to soften some of our sharp edges: the edges we all have and that sometimes seem to take on a life of their own. The cross words, the thoughtless acts, the weary spirit. From the moment we hear the plaintive Ash Wednesday call from the Book of Joel: ‘No, no – it is the Lord who speaks – come back to me with all your heart, fasting, weeping, mourning’ (Joel 2:12) we are invited into a different world, a different way of being. 

We can open our Lenten hearts to the richness of the stories of our ancestors and listen in a different way. The stories that will take us on a journey from the wilderness to the mountain top as we lean in, looking for the signs of how Jesus is to be revealed to us. We will think about the complex world in which Jesus lived and walked his way to the Cross and we will reflect on the complexity of our own times and how we are walking with Jesus. 

And for me, I think the Lenten psalms reveal in a beautiful way God’s dream for humanity – a dream that weaves its way from generation to generation. These beautiful descriptions of the deep relationship the ancient people had with their God – the God of love and truth, of presence and wisdom, of mercy and kindness. This is who God is for us – the one in whose heart we dwell.  

In his 2024 Lent message, the Pope notes that ‘In the presence of God, we become brothers and sisters, more sensitive to one another: in place of threats and enemies, we discover companions and fellow travellers. This is God’s dream, the promised land to which we journey once we have left our slavery.’ This is our Lent task, I think. To open our eyes anew to the presence of God so that we are better able to companion each other and to be agents of transformation in our fragile world. To remind us that when we look at the other we see God. We see God in all the glory and the tragedy of the human condition – because we know that we are part of the heart of the paschal mystery. 

May there be a Lent traffic light that stills our hearts and minds and may our God find a dwelling place in us. 

By Cathy Jenkins

Published: 23 February 2024