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.

God in the equation

    I am a person who has problems believing, and yet, in spite of them, perhaps because of them, I do believe. I think the right to doubt is one of the most important rights given to human beings. But I believe in God. In fact I never stopped believing in God—that's why I had the problem, the crisis of faith. If I had stopped believing, then I would have been much more at peace. It would've been okay to be disappointed in human beings. what else could you expect from a human being who is the object of seduction and all kinds of ambition, right? It is easier if God doesn't enter the equation. The moment you start to believe in God, then how can you accept the world? Do you then accept God's absence? Do you accept God's silence? God—why doesn't he tried to make people better, make them lead better lives and be kinder to each other? Why doesn't he do it? A few times he gave up. But the floods were not a punishment for sins against God but for crimes against each other. what are they doing to themselves? God thought. So he brought the floods. And it didn't help. I cannot understand two aspects of human nature: indifference and nastiness. I cannot understand. At my age, I should be able to understand. But I cannot. I do not understand. Indifference and nastiness on every level, on petty levels and on high levels.

—Elie Wiesel, Author, Holocaust Survivor, Nobel Peace Prize Winner, quoted in The God Factor, by Cathleen Falsani.

Holding contradictions in tension

"The Bible itself is absolutely teaming with contradictions. But the problem with Christianity—one of the many problems with Christianity—is that the contradictions don't seem to bother the Christians. They pick and choose and say under certain circumstances, 'Jesus said, "Turn the other cheek; love thine enemies.'" But then on a different day, with different motives they will quote the Old Testament, 'An eye for an eye,and a tooth for a tooth.' The problem is not with the contradictions themselves. I don't think the Bible is any less valuable because it's full of contradictions. The problem is Christians choose one or the other. And you have to choose both. You have to hold both of those ideas in your head at the same time."

—Author Tom Robbins, quoted in The God Factor, by Cathleen Falsani.

All truth is God's truth

"All truth is God's truth. It doesn't matter who's saying it or where it's coming from; if it's true, it's from God. Even if it's from Fargo."



Cathleen Falsani, author of The Dude Abides: The Gospel According to the Coen Brothers.

Say it

"Why do so many people have such a hard time saying, "I love you"? They ration those words, as if their meaning could be somehow cheapened or diminished were they said too many times to too many people. Is it possible to love too much? Too recklessly? Unconditionally and indescriminately?

"No. There is nothing better in life than knowing you are loved. There is no more precious gift, no sweeter burden." --Cathleen Falsani, in Sin Boldly: A Field Guide for Grace

"It's all about grace."

"You can call it what you like, categorize it, vivesect it, qualify, quantify, or dismiss it, and none of it will make grace anything other than precisely what grace is: audacious, unwarranted and unlimited. In the end, it's all about grace. — Cathleen Falsani, in Sin Boldly: A Field Guide for Grace