Everywhere on earth, the Catholic Church keeps a forty-day season of penance to prepare for Easter. The Lord Jesus fasted in the desert for forty days, so we do, too.
The question is: What do we call this season?
In English, we call it Lent. This word refers to the lengthening of the daylight hours which occurs as the season unfolds.
Most Catholics, however, do not call this season Lent.
In most languages, the name of the season comes from the word for forty: Cuaresma, Quaresima, Carême, Quadragesima.
Here is the interesting thing. We do have an English word like this, a word referring to a period of forty days. Know what it is?
Quarantine.
The time has come for us to quarantine ourselves. Sin has infected us. And this particular contagion can spread like fleas at a dog convention.
We need solitude. We need a quiet place apart to spend forty days getting over this disease. We need to remove ourselves from anything that could worsen the infection.
This forty-day quarantine will help. We have the best Doctor anyone could hope for. Under His care, we can and will recover. We will emerge from this quarantine in good health on Easter Sunday.
Father Mark,
But, quarantine is intended to protect the populice from the infected person, not the infected person from the populice.
It don’t make no never-mind. Solace and stillness is still salving for the soul. Nothing has changed from the forty days in the desert for our Lord. For that matter, humans haven’t changed since the forty years in the desert, either. It’s still the place to go.
But, the mind is a dangerous place (as our Lord identified, Mark 7: 21-23); don’t go in there alone.
LIH,
joe
Father Mark,
As always, beautifully said!!!
We understand your reference to quarantine one self so as not to allow the sin that has infected us, be spread out to the rest of the populous around us. For example, if we have anger within, we should not take it out on others around us. Hence by quarantine we keep that anger from spreading.
The time of lent is not only there so one can claim to be catholic by giving up something for 40 days. It is there for self meditation and deep prayer to bring you closer to Jesus Christ our lord and savior.
Peace and Love
Dan and Tia