Lent and a world in Turmoil

Ashley Mwanza

For some Christian denominations, the season of sacrifice is now underway. 40 days of prayer, fasting and personal sacrifice mark the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. But this year is especially hard for some believers who are already struggling because of the recession, worse still those in poverty.

For centuries, ashes have been used in religion as a symbol of mourning and penance as well as death. The ashes remind us of mortality, we are actually not invincible.

Maybe getting back to the basics closer to our families closer to our friends, maybe helping one another is the true message of this lent, but above all else giving of yourself for the betterment of others.

This is a year of hope in the midst of all turmoil and hence, many will be pondering personal change and focusing on hope.

In times of hardship, says the Rev. Richard Kremer, St. John's Baptist USA, people look for community.

“There's an innate tendency,” he says, “to … band together in secular and spiritual enterprises.”

There is a connection to the hard times. A recession is a kind of natural correction for overdoing it economically; Lent is a recession for the soul. It gives you an opportunity to do without and consider what's really important.

Some would say that economic tragedy not only makes people more reflective, but often causes them “to reach out to God.” A downturn in the economy and Lent both force Christians to face the reality of loss in life.

Lent reminds us that everything we enjoy is a gift, he says. In times like this, it reminds us that jobs and opportunities are divine gifts, not rights.

Reinvesting in the future will require a new set of priorities both for the individual citizen and for governments at all levels. President Obama said throughout his campaign: “this is not about me: it is about you.” That also comes with responsibilities, he added.

We're in the state we're in because of greed.

Lent is a good time to reflect on our consumer attitudes, spend less, save more, and think about others and our environment. And also reflect about the spiritual nature of our lives.

“A recession calls into question our assumption that we can have it all and that we can have it now,” says Hazel Buckley, a Franciscan sister. “We need to embrace the ‘ethic of enough’, which involves a decision to have only what we need, not all that we want. Leaner times can help us make this distinction. The period of Lent is a good opportunity to pare back the excesses in our life and to be content and grateful for what we already have.”

“There is no wealth but life,” as John Ruskin (English critic, essayist, and reformer - 1819 - 1900) put it.

Ashley Mwanza

In the last few days I made decisions that I now regret. We have all experienced making a decision in our lives that we thought was the right one at the time, but later discovered that it might not have been the best choice after all. Unfortunately, that is a part of life for all of us. None of us is going to make the right decision every time. Fortunately, most decisions are not a matter of life or death, and we have the opportunity to re-evaluate the situation and look at other options.

Being flexible and open to other options is a critical part of building a world that is in most cases deaf or blind to the truth. When something isn't working for us, we need to be able to admit it, rummage around for advice from others and change directions in order to find a better solution. We also need to be able to forgive ourselves and accept that we made the wrong decision and we should make use of the advice we receive, maybe that which was not available to us earlier. We then need to move on and not look back.

We cannot go back and kick ourselves for the decisions we made years ago. If you have done your research and feel that you are making the best decision at the time, you cannot second-guess yourself. You make your decisions based on the information you have at the time, and none of us make the right decision 100% of the time. We could argue the Iraq war till kingdom come but rather we should focus on picking up the pieces, together.

We ought to let it go. We have all made choices that may not always work out as planned. But, as long as we support each other and continue to build each other’s confidence, things will work out. We don't have a master plan to follow for a blind, deaf and hard of hearing humanity, so we make decisions based on what we feel is the best at the time. We can learn from it, and we may even find that what we've experienced may be helpful to someone else down the road; such is the glory of experience.

For example Zimbabwe’s MDC Party have entered into a coalition government with their long time arch-rivals, obviously they gathered all the information they can to make an informed decision in the first place. If things don't turn out as planned, they will re-evaluate the situation and make the necessary adjustments. Most things can be corrected. We shouldn’t be too hard on ourselves, because no one makes the best decisions all of the time.

We all have to make decisions, and sometimes it's hard to know which the right one is. But you did the right thing…you made a decision. If it didn't work, well fine, you learned from it. You have a better understanding of the goal that you want to achieve, and you make the necessary changes. Don't be disheartened that you made a mistake. What counts is that you made the decision. It may be hard to work to change that decision, but we can do it, and there is great benefit from it. The British and USA governments are working hard to reverse the results of their miscalculated decisions especially in the case of Iraq and on the economic front. They have now taken extra caution on the North Korean and Iran positions.

Nothing is written in stone. If you find that the decision is not the best, change it. There are no rules here to be broken.

We are human, after all. If you make a decision and decide that there was a better choice, be willing to change your mind. Don't spend valuable time feeling guilty, if you have done your homework. You need your energy for advocating, for working with your adversaries, and for just being different in a complex world.

While the thought of having to make so many decisions in our lives may be overwhelming, remember that most do not need to be made immediately. You are not alone in having to make these decisions. We are together!

We should all accept the fact that we made and we will continue to make mistakes, even if we don’t want to. The best way to avoid doing mistakes is to learn from the ones that we’ve already made, and to know more about the decision we are going to take tomorrow.