Lent, perfection and grace

We may be believers, but our belief is sometimes shaky. We may be redeemed, but we are far from perfect creatures.

None of us wants to be defined by our worst moments. And our faith tells us that God doesn’t define us that way, either. That doesn’t mean, however, that we should try to obscure our shortcomings, inconsistencies and failures, whether moral, ethical or of conscience.

Lent, which begins in most of Christendom in a few days, is the period during which we believers are meant to be preparing ourselves for the coming Eastertide. We are supposed to take stock, prayerfully. Repent. Prepare our hearts and souls for the resurrection. Lent is the time when we should be the most honest with ourselves and with God. Look our sins and shortcomings and failures straight in the eye.

As I understand it, the point of the Easter story — of Jesus’ suffering, death and resurrection — is that we can’t fix ourselves by ourselves. We cannot live a perfect life that would earn our place in the kingdom.

Lent points to Easter and the point of Easter is grace.

We can’t do it by ourselves. In fact, it’s nothing that we do ourselves that remakes our hearts and minds into the kind of perfection that God deserves from the people he loves (and who are supposed to love God).

Our leaders (civil or religious) should not be expected to live perfect, consistent lives any more than the rest of us should. We are all hypocrites. We are all conflicted. We all make mistakes.

To pretend otherwise is a lie that cheapens the grace that goes before us all.

--Cathleen Falsani at The Dude Abides.