Week 11 Wednesday (Year 2)

Readings: 2 Kings 2.1, 6-14; Psalm 30/31; Matthew 6.1-6, 16-18

There is a reward either way for fasting, praying and almsgiving. If our motivation is to be seen and admired by others then we will already have had our reward in their attention and their interest in us. If we do these things for their own sake, in secret, without fanfare, and without drawing attention to ourselves, then the Heavenly Father who sees in secret will reward us. This is the teaching of Jesus in today's gospel reading which is also the gospel reading for Ash Wednesday.

What will be the nature of our reward? It is impossible to predict except that it will be what is for our greatest good and happiness. That means it will bind us more closely to the Heavenly Father who dwells in silence and invisibility.

When we have said all we have to say in prayer, when we have prepared ourselves through fasting, and when we have given alms to the needy, then we encounter without ourselves a silent and empty place where words, images and concepts no longer function for us. We encounter within ourselves the dark cloud in which God is said to dwell. 

That presents us with the challenge of living from the interior to the exterior rather than the other way around. It is all too easy to give in to the temptation to fill that invisible and silent place with images and sounds. The contemporary world swamps us with images and sounds chosen especially for us by the systems that are tracking us all the time. It is a kind of lethargy which leads us to give in to the exterior stimulation once again, to turn away from the austerity of our interior self.

So what about switching off the computer, iPad and smartphone? What about fasting from them for a while? Irt would move us to an arid, desert place where we would be obliged to encounter our own thoughts, feelings and desires directly. 

To persevere in that secret place, our own interiority, is not easy, but the Heavenly Father is there, waiting for us. It is essential for our salvation that we do manage to stay in that place. It means staying with ourselves, facing up to ourselves, without dressing ourselves up in disguises and camouflage, in some kind of false persona.

All the works of penance lead to that point - fasting, praying, and sharing what we have with others. In those activities, or our avoidance of them, we see the truth about ourselves, a truth that will set us free no matter how unpalatable it is, even if it is at times a bitter truth. But it will become sweet because any truth is a divine spark revealing the presence of God who is Truth.