Reflecting and shedding some layers during Lent
The early spring sunshine illumined the delicate greens of the leaves on the whitethorn bushes as I walked along the narrow laneway in the early morn. Frogs were spawning in the waters in the flaggin bottoms that mared the bog road.
There in a little field that had just been topped of its rushes stood still a brown donkey basking in the sunshine, allowing the sun’s rays to warm its back and melt the dusting of frost that covered it. Its ears were cocked to attention on hearing my passing footsteps and there on its back were perched two little sparrows undisturbed by the movement of the donkey’s ears, pulling with all their might, tufts of hair from its back, hair that would line their nest or form part of the insulation of its walls.
The donkey seemed unperturbed by the workings of the little birds, accustomed to their visit each and every springtime and, over the weeks to come, there would follow robins, blue tits and chaffinches to assist the donkey in the shedding of its winter coat. Though bedraggled looking in the meantime, come the summer months, it would don a sleeker brown coat whose sheen would catch the glimmers of the midday sun high in the sky.
As I walked on the road past Mary Maggie’s beneath the outstretched branches of the Sally trees, I thought on the donkey and its shedding coat and came to recognise that in the springtime, it is that which Lent is all about; the shedding of layers that we have donned over the years of our lives.
Lent is a period of reflection, a time for looking inward, precipitated by fasting prayer and acts of charity, but essentially it is a period of journeying inwards, of pausing in the springtime of the year and asking of ourselves - which layers we need to shed.
We put on layers as we live for many different reasons, overcoats that often conceal the true person that lies beneath. Like the donkey, if we don’t shed these layers, we become bedraggled and weighed down as time moves on.
At times we put on layers to cover over hurt and pain that can lie deep within.
For example we might ask ourselves, why have I let my anger take over my living, causing tension in the home, having people tiptoe around me? Why have I donned this outer layer and yet feel deep remorse for it within, could it be a reaction to latent hurt caused over time, hurt that is masked by this layer of anger so as not to be hurt again?
Why do we drink alcohol to excess or take drugs? Talking to young people, some tell us that it is to give a layer of confidence, to socialise, to become less self-conscious, to relax, to take away pain. Others say it is to enable them to talk to their peers, another layer to hide the vulnerabilities that lie beneath, of not feeling good enough, pretty enough, strong enough and so they become dependent over time, a crutch that never fills the void, which becomes a chasm deep within.
There are so many different examples of layers we put on and, if we do not pause and reflect, acknowledging that we need to change, we will continue putting on layer upon layer until we are finally weighed down.
When people attended more regularly, the sacrament of reconciliation facilitated this ‘unlayering’ where one laid bare one’s inner life to receive the gift of healing from God in the sacrament. Unfortunately, at times, it was judgement rather than healing that many experienced. This sacrament evolved in the early monastic church where monks were accompanied by an ‘Anam Chara’, a soul friend through the days of their lives, one in whom they could confide and who, like the like the birds helping to shed the winter coat to reveal that which lay beneath, the monk was guided bit by bit over time to unravel the many layers he had put on to reveal the true self, the self that God had first envisaged them to be.
In this season of renewal, we are called to reflect and acknowledge the need for an ‘unlayering’, the need to shed the coats we have put on so as not to hide but to reveal the true self, the real self, albeit with hurts and vulnerabilities, the self in need of healing that lies beneath the coat we have put on.
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