February 18, 2024 (First Sunday in Lent)
/“What Awaits Us in the Desert?”
by Fr. Dominic DeLay, O.P.
[This is the text composed by the homilist prior to delivering the homily.]
What awaits us in the desert of Lent? Why does the Spirit drive Jesus into the desert? Drive is the same word used for Jesus driving out demons and driving out the moneychangers from the temple. Jesus is driven into the desert by the Spirit, the same Spirit that just descended on him in baptism when the voice from the heavens declared, “You are my beloved Son…” That same Spirit drives us who have been baptized and those seeking baptism into the desert. We are thrust into the desert, not to earn but to learn, not to earn God’s love but to learn anew the truth of our baptism, which carries God’s voice promising each of us, “You are my beloved child.” Echoing the forty years of the Israelites’ formative journey, Jesus needed forty days to discover the meaning of God’s love for him. We need that forty-day biblical journey to discover the depths of God’s love for us and to be transformed by that love.
What awaits us in the desert? Jesus was among wild beasts in the desert, the wilderness, the quiet place. What wild beasts will we encounter? Unlike Jesus, who didn’t have time to make a plan for his time in the desert – he didn’t even know how long he’d be there – we know the parameters and have had time to make plans. Of course, plans attract certain wild beasts, such as busyness and distraction. Not only do busyness and distraction keep us from our plans, but also we can become busy with the plans themselves. In other words, we can become busy with our prayer, fasting, and almsgiving, turning them into projects to check off for the day rather than practices that drive us into the arms of God. But that’s okay, because the wild beasts are the point. We’re meant to confront these wild beasts, including busyness and distraction, and the other wild beasts that busyness and distraction keep us from detecting.
What awaits us in the desert? Busyness with work and other activities, including the works of Lent, distract us from seeing the lurking bigger beasts, such as despair. We doomscroll yet don’t realize we’re sinking into despair. Or we give in to despair and give up on news and politics altogether. We despair of the world changing, and we despair of ever being healed from our habitual sins. We cease to hear ourselves complain and gossip, not realizing we’re actually complaining against God just as the Israelites did in the desert. We don’t realize our despair has led us to casually taking up idolatry, putting our own projects or pleasures ahead of prayer. As rabid despair sinks his teeth into our flesh, sloth, anger, and violence set in. We do violence to ourselves with silent condemnations we don’t even hear. We do violence to others through our words, defensiveness, and resentments. We despair of solving violence in the world without violence. We condone or passively become complicit in violent pseudo-solutions. Before we know it, we’re talking oxymoronically about humane execution and the rules of war. Or we’re not talking at all.
What awaits us in the desert? The wild beasts are real, but so are the angels. While Jesus was in the desert among the wild beasts, the angels ministered to him. If we let them, God’s angels minister to us in the desert. They feed us with the body and blood, the life force, of Jesus. They feed us with God’s meaty words in the scriptures. God’s angels lead us to the sacrament river of reconciliation, where we slake our desert thirst and are cleansed from our sins, returning to baptismal hope. Our recurring sin has become an occasion of grace, turning us to rely on God rather than ourselves. We remember that God loves us equally with and without our sin. God’s angels tilt our heads up from our despair, and we see that we are not alone. We walk with each other, not wandering aimlessly in the desert, but making our way, together, little by little, to Easter and new life. We see the candidates for Easter initiation in our midst, and our own faith is renewed. During this Black History month, God’s angels remind us how Black Americans sowed seeds of active, loving nonviolence in the desert, seeds which blossomed before and can blossom again with the water of hope.
What awaits us in the desert? God’s angels hold us steady long enough for us to learn not to run from the wild beasts but to confront them, even befriend them. We are grateful that the wild beasts have led us to look for God’s help and to remember God’s ineffable love for us. We realize that these wild beasts are afraid too. These wild beasts of busyness, distraction, sloth, anger, and violence, riding on the back of the wild beast of despair, look to us for stillness and peace. With God’s angels at our side, we learn that our God-trusting quiet quiets the wild beasts as well. Might such a stillness quiet the fears of our enemies?
What awaits us in the desert and beyond? Jesus came to understand and encounter God’s baptismal love for him more and more deeply. He left the desert filled with hope and proclaimed, “This is the time of fulfillment. The kingdom of God is at hand.” May our desert journey together be an occasion to learn more deeply of God’s infinite love for us. May we be prepared this Lent to leave the desert with the courage to proclaim God’s peaceable Easter kingdom with renewed hope.
