Fourth Sunday of Lent

There’s a line from Dante’s “Inferno:” In the middle of the journey of our life, I found myself in a dark wood, for I had lost the right path.  In so many ways, that describes the journey of all of us – struggling to find our way in a world of confusion and chaos, of distractions and disturbances.  A world of fear, and temptation, and sin.  A world that so often offers us only darkness.

But this Sunday, the darkness lifts.  Just past the halfway point in Lent, we put aside purple to put on rose – and rejoice.  It’s “Laetare Sunday.”  Our journey toward Easter is nearing its end.  We can see the light, in every sense.  No less than five times in this gospel passage we just heard, St. John mentions light.  He is speaking of the light of Christ, the light of life, the light of our Easter hope.

And it couldn’t be more timely.  Just look around you.  We just started Daylight Savings Time, with an extra hour of light at the end of our day.  The first day of spring will soon be here and we hurtle inevitably toward warmth, and growth – and light.  Brave daffodils have started to sprout in the Skagit Valley.  Sprigs of grass are returning.  The world is awakening.

And: just as the earth right now turns closer to the sun, we need to turn back to the source of all light, as well.  The gospel reminds us: the source of that light is boundless, unfathomable love.  “For God so loved the world,” John writes in his gospel, “that God gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him might not perish, but might have eternal life.”

That is the beautiful gift we are being offered.  Are we willing to accept it?  Are we prepared to draw back the curtains and let in the light?  Lent is a time for us to ask those questions – and more.  Where have we failed?  How have we fallen short?  How have we put distance between ourselves and God?  How have we blocked the light?

In some way, all of us have.  It seems like it was ages ago, but we can’t forget: we are people who have been marked.  Last month, in the middle of an ordinary week, crowds of parishioners and visitors came to this church to have their foreheads stained with ash.  We wore our mistakes for the world to see.  The ash reminds us of our past.

But the light we hear about today is the promise of our future.  That is the meaning of this Sunday.  We rejoice because the miracle of the resurrection is closer.  And we rejoice because God’s love – a love that came into the world and suffered death for the world – offers us something beyond measure.  It holds out mercy.  Forgiveness.  Redemption.  It holds out light.

I mentioned words from Dante at the beginning – words that proclaim a beautiful and enduring truth.  “And so we came forth,” Dante wrote, “and once again beheld the stars.”  This Sunday, we rejoice because we are reminded of the light that came into the world, and is always near.  We rejoice because of this: even when it seems we are in the darkness of night, there are stars.

Paul A. Magnano

Pastor