In the traditional Roman breviary the first reading of Matins for Sunday contained the words of Jeremiah the prophet: “Et dixi: A, a, a,” which, being translated, reads “And I said ah, ah, ah,” which is probably how a lot of us feel by this time in Lent. When we look back at these weeks we may feel rather discouraged. Perhaps we don’t seem to have done anything with Lent at all, or perhaps when we consider those things we wanted to give up we find we’re now consuming double, triple, the amount instead. It might be that our Lenten privations haven’t directed us to the Lord at all, and are just making us angry, resentful, and sullen; our Lenten sacrifices may have proven far more of a penance for those around us than ourselves. The spiritual book unopened, the prayers unsaid, the soul coasting along rather than renewed …. “argh, argh, argh” might be our preferred translation of Jeremiah at this point.

And so thanks be to God for Passiontide. The veils covering the statutes, and images, and crosses, direct us inward; this is the “boot camp” part of Lent when we can pull up the socks of our soul and really go back to the heart of it all. Why the veils? “Jesus hid himself, and went out from the temple.” This is the point in Our Lord’s approach to his Passion that he no longer went about openly, but withdrew to be amongst his friends, the disciples, and his followers. That is where he now invites us: to come into that inner circle of his, to find our place again beside him.

For those of us who are so helped by the beauty of sacred images this is a rather challenging time — where are we supposed to look when we are praying in church? We can of course take our favourite holy card out of our missal or breviary — the sacristan isn’t going to suddenly jump out and snatch it from us or throw purple paint over it. The real challenge is that invitation to close our eyes, to close our ears to the noise of the world, and to seek the Lord where we know he is to be found, or at least to invite him in. That is what St Philip prayed: “I look for you, but I do not find you. Come to me Lord Jesus”.

In my family, whenever death visited us, we covered the mirrors and emptied the vases of water. The veiling of mirrors was something to do with ghosts that I can’t fully remember, but maybe there was also something about not looking at oneself, not entertaining all those thoughts of guilt and regret that come with the passing of those we love, not brooding by looking at ourselves but remembering that life goes on.

Our veils invite us inward — not to focus on ourselves, but to direct our gaze to God. To use this time to walk with him to Jerusalem, to the Cross, and to live again that moment when the veil of the Temple is rent in twain, and our hearts with them. To go to Calvary with him, that we might find him in the Garden then, and greet him not in shock, not in embarrassment, but in profound and awe-filled gratitude when the veil of death is lifted at last and for ever, and finally we are able to see.

I don’t keep a journal, and I’m not a great believer in writing notes to my future self. But it’s at this point in Lent each year that I am tempted to put a note in my calendar for the start of Lent next year to say: It’s not that bad!

Lent seems always to begin with a feeling of dread at the thought of spending every day hungry and longing for the small amount of food I have to give up. And it always begins at such a cold and dark time of the year. February is hardly a meteorological highlight in the UK.

But, in fact, that’s all an overreaction. Lent works. And one of the ways it works is to make us realise that, actually, it’s not that bad. Those things we give up, that we fear we can’t live without — we can. And by this point in Lent, we should be feeling something of the freedom that saying “no” to ourselves can bring.

That’s not the only thing we can forget each year. Lent is really a rather beautiful time. Not only should we quite like the extra time we give ourselves for prayer and works of charity, but the days get longer and the temperature is rising. And that makes it just that bit easier for us to picture what we are looking forward to: the bursting forth of Life from the tomb.

This year, our series of Lent talks have proved popular: Saints for Sinners. And it’s easy to see why. We like to know that holiness — to which we are called — is possible. And the Lives of the Saints are a tremendous gift to us for they illustrate one of the consoling truths of the Christian faith: holiness is not the reward of the perfect but the triumph of grace in the imperfect. These men and women recognised their sin and chose to do something about it, allowing God to transform them.

When we look closely at the saints, we discover something striking. Many of them began far from sanctity. St Peter denied Christ three times. St Augustine spent years wandering in error and moral confusion. St Mary Magdalene had a troubled past. St Paul persecuted the Church he would one day serve with heroic fidelity. And yet the Church honours them not because they never fell, but because they did not remain fallen.

Holiness begins not with perfection but with honesty. A saint is someone who stops pretending before God. The sinner who says, “Lord, have mercy on me,” is already closer to holiness than the person who imagines he has no need of God’s mercy. This is why the Gospel is such good news for sinners. Christ did not say, “Come to me, all you who are already holy.” He said: “I have not come to call the righteous but sinners.”

In fact, the very weakness we lament can become the place where grace works most powerfully. St Philip, used to pray each morning: “Lord, watch over Philip today, or Philip will betray you.” That prayer was not despair; it was realism. And from that realism grew great joy and the freedom of the Children of God.

The saints are therefore not distant beings meant to daunt or discourage us. They are companions on the road, living proof that grace can work in ordinary, fragile people like ourselves. If God could make a saint out of Peter the coward, or the errant Augustine, or Paul the persecutor, then no life is beyond hope. It simply requires that we allow God to be merciful and that we let him forgive us.

“Every saint has a past. Every sinner has a future.” Words of Oscar Wilde, a former resident of our parish, who knew the truth of those words which illustrate the point that if not all the saints began well, they all ended well. Hope for us all!

Lent is difficult. We don’t like giving up things. We don’t like denying ourselves. We don’t like penance very much. Because it is so hard. And Easter always seems so very far away. Our Lord spent forty days in the desert, and that wasn’t easy: the heat, the cold, the hunger. Lent is supposed to be long. And difficult. We are supposed to feel our self denial and our penance. It is supposed to be a wilderness time. A time of testing.

In fact, we are not called to do or be anything during the forty days of Lent that we are not called to do or be during the rest of the year — or the rest of our lives. Yes, we give up chocolate or wine or biscuits for Lent, or pray more, or give a bit more to charity. But this is symbolic: it’s meant to represent the fundamental attitude of our whole life. It is meant to symbolise our obedience to the command of Christ — Repent, and believe the Good News — and that command is not just for Lent. It’s for the whole of our lives.

Repent. Turn away from sin. Turn away from anything and everything that keeps us from God. We must turn from our own pleasure, our own comfort and convenience, our own will. We are not the centre of the universe; it’s not all about me. I must turn away from myself, so that I can turn back to God and to other people.

Repent, and believe the Good News. To say that we repent is easy enough; even confessing to a priest is not all that difficult — despite what we might sometimes feel. It is the believing that is, surprisingly, the harder part. Christ himself called believing “work”. When the people asked him: “What must we do if we are to do the works that God wants?” Our Lord answered: “This is working for God: you must believe in the one he has sent.”

Believing is hard work because it inescapably includes works. As St James tells us: Faith without good works is dead. So when Our Lord says we must believe, he also means we must do the works of believing. We have to live what we believe. We have to put our faith into practice. If we believe that Christ is the Beloved Son of God, we have to listen to him, and do what he tells us, and change our lives.

There is no way to get from Oxford to London except by car, bike, bus or train (when they are running). We can’t just believe ourselves there. Our pilgrimage of faith — our journey through this Christian life — is like that: step by step. Mass by Mass. Confession by confession. Communion by communion. Prayer by prayer. Good deed by good deed.

On Ash Wednesday we came once again to the edge of the desert, which we have to cross. It will be difficult; just as life as a whole can be difficult. It requires a bit of work on our part.

But, lest we get discouraged after the first tough week, the Church gives us the story of the Transfiguration on the second Sunday of Lent. We heard again how Christ went up a high mountain with three of his disciples and was transfigured in their presence. His glory is allowed to peek through his humanity and shine out, for just a moment. Not for his sake, but to reveal to Peter, and James, and John, and to us, that even though he was about to suffer, even though it would soon become very difficult to be his disciples, he is the Lord. He would rise from the dead, and then we would see his glory. He told them that he would conquer death, and transform suffering, and defeat sin. That they — and we — must not be afraid.

The Transfiguration was to confirm and strengthen their faith and give them courage for the trials they were to undergo — the passion of Christ, the preaching of the Gospel, and their own martyrdoms too.

The disciples did what any of us would do. They wanted to build tents so that they could capture and hold on to the experience of the Transfiguration. They wanted to stay there. But it was not yet Easter, and there was much left to happen. They had to return to ordinary life. To the difficulties of human existence. To the trials of being disciples of the Lord.

The Transfiguration — and, indeed, our annual celebration of Easter itself — is a preview of heaven, a little glimpse to sustain us and encourage us on the journey of Lent, and the journey of life. It points to our final destination — the glory of life with Christ in the world to come. But it tells us that we are not there yet. God gives each of us glimpses of himself. He gives us all sorts of spiritual consolations and experiences, moments of joy and happiness in our lives. But we can’t stay in those moments. They don’t last very long. We have to come back down again from the mountain to the business of life; the work of repenting and of believing.

We now find ourselves a week into Lent. It always seems to be around now that the packet of Jaffa Cakes left lurking at the back of the cupboard starts to call out to us the loudest. When we start thinking about what to give up for Lent, it’s all too easy to get swept up in a bit of ascetic bravado and set ourselves quite the challenge. This time last week, Ash Wednesday, was a fast day — that’s alright, it’s only a day after all, it’ll be over soon. But now we find ourselves with a good long road stretching out ahead through the rest of Lent. The light (or perhaps, the Creme Egg) at the end of the tunnel seems too far off to even make out — and we find ourselves wanting to give up on the Lenten fast we chose.

But the great thing is to persevere: it is not he who begins, but he that perseveres to the end, who shall be saved. We must remember, of course, to set ourselves bite-sized goals. Our holy father St Philip taught that “One of the most excellent means of obtaining perseverance is discretion; we must not wish to do everything at once, or become a saint in four days.” We can’t give everything up at once, because we are human: we know our own nature, and that our strength — or at least our good grace — would fail us if we gave too much up, and then we would give up our good practices and be no better than we were on Shrove Tuesday. But we must persevere in what we have given up! One of our Lenten Devotions here at the Oratory is the Stations of the Cross every Friday evening during Lent, and as we go round the church we sing the Stabat Mater, the Sequence in honour of Our Lady of Sorrows. It reminds us:

At the Cross her station keeping,
Stood the mournful mother weeping,
Close to Jesus to the last.

Our Lady stood faithfully through the bitterest trial a person can face: seeing her innocent Son crucified for the sins of the world. But it was there, in the midst of his Passion, that Our Lord gave her to us to be our Mother, too. Her prayers help us through our Lenten fasts, as we journey to join her at the foot of her Son’s Cross on Good Friday.

By the Cross with thee to stay,
There with thee to weep and pray,
Is all I ask of thee to give.

It’s ever so tempting to cave in, but if we manage to persevere in this we can go on to even greater things. It’s a little like those incessant adverts for the Royal Navy that used to be shown while you were waiting for your film to start in the cinema — if you can fix a skateboard you can fix a bike, and then all of a sudden you’re fixing an aircraft carrier. The spiritual life is much the same, really: Lent gives us a chance to fix our skateboards. If we can persevere through these few weeks giving up some little treat we enjoy, like having a Jaffa Cake with our morning coffee, then we can leave a little more room in our hearts for loving our neighbour. And if we can love our neighbour a little more, we can love those people we don’t really like very much some more, too. And if we can love them, we can love God a little more. And when we are finally called to fix the celestial aircraft carrier, we can hear those sweet words of Our Lord: ‘Well done, good and faithful servant. You have been faithful in little things; I will set you over many things. Enter into the joy of your Lord.’