Lent, Day 7

Holy Spirit,
giving life to all life,
moving all creatures,
root of all things,
washing them clean,
wiping out their mistakes,
healing their wounds,
you are our true life,
luminous, wonderful,
awakening the heart
from its ancient sleep.

-Hildegard of Bingen, tr. Stephen Mitchell

Lent, Day 6

Lord, bless to me this Lent.

Lord, let me fast most truly and profitably,
by feeding in prayer on thy Spirit:
reveal me to myself
in the light of thy holiness.

Suffer me never to think
that I have knowledge enough to need no teaching,
wisdom enough to need no correction,
talents enough to need no grace,
goodness enough to need no progress,
humility enough to need no repentance,
devotion enough to need no quickening,
strength sufficient without thy Spirit;
lest, standing still, I fall back for evermore.

Show me the desires that should be disciplined,
and sloths to be slain.
show me the omissions to be made up
and the habits to be mended.
And behind these, weaken, humble and annihilate in me self-will, self-righteousness, self-satisfaction, self-sufficiency, self-assertion, vainglory.

May my whole effort be to return to thee;
O make it serious and sincere
persevering and fruitful in result,
by the help of thy Holy Spirit
and to thy glory,
my Lord and my God.

–Eric Milner-White

Lent, Day 5

To Keep a True Lent

IS this a fast, to keep
The larder lean ?
And clean
From fat of veals and sheep ?

Is it to quit the dish
Of flesh, yet still
To fill
The platter high with fish ?

Is it to fast an hour,
Or ragg’d to go,
Or show
A downcast look and sour ?

No ; ‘tis a fast to dole
Thy sheaf of wheat,
And meat,
Unto the hungry soul.

It is to fast from strife,
From old debate
And hate ;
To circumcise thy life.

To show a heart grief-rent ;
To starve thy sin,
Not bin ;
And that’s to keep thy Lent.

-Robert Herrick

First Sunday in Lent

It’s true, we cannot reach Christ’s forti’eth day;
Yet to go part of that religious way,
Is better than to rest:
We cannot reach our Saviour’s purity;
Yet we are bid, ‘Be holy ev’n as he, ‘
In both let’s do our best.

Who goeth in the way which Christ hath gone,
Is much more sure to meet with him, than one
That travelleth by-ways:
Perhaps my God, though he be far before,
May turn and take me by the hand, and more:
May strengthen my decays.

Yet Lord instruct us to improve our fast
By starving sin and taking such repast,
As may our faults control:
That ev’ry man may revel at his door,
Not in his parlour; banqueting the poor,
And among those his soul.

-George Herbert, from Lent

Lent, Days 3 and 4

Our Father whose creative Will
Asked Being for us all
Confirm it that Thy Primal Love
May weave in us the freedom of
The actually deficient on
The justly actual.

Though written by Thy children with
A smudged and crooked line
The Word is ever legible
Thy Meaning unequivocal
And for Thy Goodness even sin
Is valid as a sign.

Inflict Thy promises with each
Occasion of distress
That from our incoherence we
May learn to put our trust in Thee
And brutal fact persuade us to
Adventure Art and Peace.

-W.H. Auden, from For the Time Being


O God, we pray this day:
for all who have a song they cannot sing;
for all who have a burden they cannot bear;
for all who live in chains they cannot break.
for all who wander homeless and cannot return;
for those who are sick and for those who tend them;
for those who wait for loved ones and wait in vain.
for those who live in hunger
and for those who will not share their bread,
for those who are misunderstood
and for those who misunderstand;
for those who are captive and for those who are captors,
for those whose words of love are locked within their hearts
and for those who yearn to hear those words.

Have mercy on these, O God.
Have mercy on us all.

- Ann Weems

Lent, Day 2

Sometimes, hard-trying, it seems I cannot pray—
For doubt, and pain, and anger, and all strife,
Yet some poor half-fledged prayer-bird from the nest
May fall, flit, fly, perch—crouch in the bowery breast
of the large, nation-healing tree of life;
Moveless there sit through all the burning day,
And on my heart at night a fresh leaf cooling lay.

-George MacDonald

Ash Wednesday

I'm planning to post a poem each in day in Lent. Here's the first, for Ash Wednesday:

THOU art indeed just, Lord, if I contend
With thee; but, sir, so what I plead is just.
Why do sinners’ ways prosper? and why must
Disappointment all I endeavour end?
Wert thou my enemy, O thou my friend,
How wouldst thou worse, I wonder, than thou dost
Defeat, thwart me? Oh, the sots and thralls of lust
Do in spare hours more thrive than I that spend,
Sir, life upon thy cause. See, banks and brakes
Now leavèd how thick! lacèd they are again
With fretty chervil, look, and fresh wind shakes
Them; birds build—but not I build; no, but strain,
Time’s eunuch, and not breed one work that wakes.
Mine, O thou lord of life, send my roots rain.

-Gerard Manley Hopkins