Dear Friends,
I’m sure I date myself all the time in this newsletter as a fairly young person in the formation space, but I’m about to do it again. I was in the eighth grade when Dan Brown’s bestseller, The DaVinci Code, soared to popularity and it was absolutely a hit with me. I quickly read several more of his books, at least one of which I remember having at my bedside during a family vacation.
As much as I enjoyed these fast-paced mysteries, though, they may not have been the most significant piece of it all for me. No, more notable in my memory was the great length of time I spent calculating the Fibonacci sequence – a critical code element from The DaVince Code – in the back of my math notebook to entertain myself. Consider it one of the nerdier alternatives to doodling in the margins.
That number quickly grew enormous and while it had no particular purpose, I plugged away at it.
Why is this relevant? It’s not, exactly.
No, I’m thinking about the Fibonacci sequence because, as we stand here on the border between Ordinary Time and Lent, preparing to cross that threshold, I was thinking about the number 40.
Lent is 40 days (except that it isn’t).
It rained for 40 days and 40 nights in the story of Noah’s Ark (which is just one of many similar Great Flood stories).
The Israelites are said to have wandered in the desert for 40 years (but Moses was also 120 years old when he died, so I have some questions about that calendar).
All of this is to say that I started thinking about the number 40 because it IS important to the great story we are entering into and thinking about this number led me to think about it’s many applications. That led me to the Wikipedia page for the number 40 and to assorted mathematical functions surrounding Euler’s number and off down some old, but well-trod neurological pathway to the Fibonacci Sequence, which does not contain the number 40 (only 34 and 55).
The good news about all this nonsense (other than that you can ignore it if you want or if, like my mother, thinking about their ever being a letter in your mathematics makes you want to bury your head in the sand) is that 40 is mostly just a symbol. The number 40 is an arrow pointing us towards something else.
Seasons & Symbols
It is, as with so many aspects of Christian tradition, useful to think about the repeating appearances of the number 40 as some type of symbol, and a major interpretation of this symbol is that it indicates that some kind of change is coming. Lent will lead us toward Christ’s death and resurrection, the clearest manifestation of how he turns everything inside out and upside down.
If you haven’t told it yet, this is a good time to turn to the Mystery of Easter (with a reminder that we no longer use the language of “pure celebration” in association with the color white. (If you’re not sure why, see the Equity Audit toolkit for the Circle of the Church Year, which gives a good breakdown of some of the basic points of implicit bias that we want to be actively addressing in our work.)
The forty (plus) days of Lent help us to prepare our hearts and minds for this remarkable disorientation, but how do we explore this space of interior transformation with children?
I was struck by this tweet from a #WAT mainstay -
Any of these traditional Lent practices can obviously be introduced to children in developmentally appropriate ways, but when I think about what it means to prepare for Easter, to develop Lenten practices, I think about disruption. I turn towards ways we can connect children with that theme in ways that deepen faith.
So, where do we begin?
We begin with the normal order of things. And we look for faithful ways of disrupting that normal.
Does your parish offer a Lenten soup supper or other weeknight devotional? If it’s doesn’t run past bedtime, consider attending, even just once or twice. If that’s not an option for you family, consider introducing a special devotional practice into a humdrum part of your routine, such as during your commute or while making dinner.
For younger children, I recommend the Pray As You Go Examen for Children; they also have other Examen structures, Breath Prayers, music recommendations, and other resources.
For something to listen to with your teens, check out SpadeSpoonSoul, the EvolvingFaith podcast, or even Kate Bowler’s Everything Happens – any of these is sure to open up interesting questions and conversations.
Model making space for prayer and talk about what you’re doing. Maybe you’re swapping out scrolling TikTok for praying the Office with the Venite app or listening to more devotional music. We learn the faith that is modeled for us.
Color-code Your Days: On Sunday, I made a countdown to Easter paper chain with my church school kids and we used key colors to mark the season ahead. Challenge you kids to coordinate Lenten purple outfits on Sundays, play purple I-Spy, change your table linens, or otherwise emphasize this liturgical season using color. When the white and gold of Easter arrive, the transformation will shake up everything.
Make Almsgiving Meaningful: Anyone who has ever worked with me knows that I believe in service projects, but I won’t just do a project for its own sake. I need to ensure we’ve contextualized the work, especially with young children. So, given that almsgiving is a pillar of Lent, how do we make it meaningful?
Share a story: In Godly Play, we often say that story is one of the first languages of children, which is why picture books can be a great tool for preparing children to engage in service activities. Among my favorites are “Last Stop On Market Street” by Matt de la Peña (about serving at a soup kitchen), “Harlem Grown” by Tony Hillery (about a community clean-up that leads to a new urban garden), and “What Is Given From The Heart” by Patricia C. McKissack (about finding ways to give when you don’t have much because there’s almost always someone who has less).
Invite Observation: Even very young children have noticed people asking for money on the side of the road or the cans or other food donations your community might bring to the altar at church, among other specific community needs. Ask them if they’ve noticed a problem they want to fix or something they want to help. The older the child, the more deeply you’re able to explore paths toward social transformation.
Again and again, I come here with a simple premise: that what we do does not have to be flashy or complicated. What matters is that it is intentional and based on relationship. And, if you haven’t read it yet, I highly commend to you this new article from BuildingFaith, care of editor Jodi Belcher: “A Shame-freeing Lent: Stories & Practices for Liberating Lenten Formation” While I’m here for all the sin and wretchedness I can get, I know you’ve got to be coming from a particular perspective for that to be a viable approach to faith.
May you Lent be holy and life-giving as we await the resurrection and return of the one who turns everything inside out and upside down, the one who “make[s] beautiful things out of dust.”
Peace,
Bird