A Lenten Fast to Live By, Lent Study 2024, Week 4
by Marjorie George
My best friend in high school was Carol Watson. She was the student every teacher wanted in their class. Her dog never ate her homework, her papers were always neatly typed, and she passed every test quite adequately.
The high school we attended was an expansion school, meaning the school district added one grade level a year as the school was being built. The year the school opened was our freshman year, and we were the only class on campus. The next year the district added sophomore level to the school, and we were it. And so on until, in 1961, we were the first class to graduate from that school.
High school is supposed to be a learning experience, and not always of the kind found in books. The cheerleader saga comes to mind. In our freshman year, the teachers selected what girls would be on the new school cheerleading squad, and Carol was chosen. Of course. And she did an adequate job of it.
But the next year, our sophomore year, the student body selected the cheerleaders. Carol didn’t even try-out. It wasn’t worth the risk, she said, that she might not be chosen by her fellow students. Recognition by teachers was not on the same level as the approval of one’s peers.
Thus ended the short, happy career of my friend Carol as a cheerleader. Another victim of invulnerability.
In chapter 4 of A Different Kind of Fast, Christine Valters Paintner writes that being vulnerable often brings us to tears. But those are the tears of humility that reveal all that is tender and vulnerable within us. Jesus’ hours on the cross , says Paintner, were witness to “radical vulnerability as a portal to divine grace” (pg 158).
In the culture of strength and aggressiveness in which we live, says Paintner, we are encouraged to bypass grief and not allow it the space of healing. Consequently, our lives and our relationships suffer (pg 160). It is time, admonishes Paintner, to let go of the ways we try to hold it all together and “give space to the exquisite vulnerability of being human” (pg 160).
Questions for Reflection:
As you read chapter 4, think about in what situations you are most likely to feel the need to hold yourself all together. What are the triggers that elicit this need?
Paintner writes, “I also remember that the places of the greatest disruption in my life have surprisingly been, too, the occasions of the most profound gifts (p.159). How have you experienced this in your own life?
What are some of the roles you play in which you feel you must be the strong and responsible one? What might happen if you weren’t?
What are the ways you try to avoid feeling your sorrow? What are your coping mechanisms?
Practices for this week:
What practices can you put in place to relieve the stress of feeling like you have to hold it all together? Taking a walk? Lunch with a particular person? Meditation or contemplative prayer? Yoga?
Is there something in your life that you have not grieved fully? What is holding you back from this? Is there someone who could help you do this?
The Wisdom Years 