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The Grass Grows Greener
Even though I lived through the liberated days of the nineteen-sixties, when long-haired youths smoked mind-altering herbs through bubble pipes, the nearest I ever came to adding anything to my usual briar of Condor was when I accidentally slipped a few grains of incense into the mixture whilst relaxing in a pub after a service. The landlord, fearful for his license, was narrowly dissuaded from calling the constabulary after I protested that the smell was Prinknesh, not hashish. The odour was satisfying but the taste was foul.
Politicians of all shades, health officials, and police officers, who, in their youth probably sampled marijuana (but did not inhale), have been quick to point out that downgrading the drug does not legalise it. Nevertheless, dropping standards has the effect of making the people think that they have a green light to roll a spliff and claim that it is for medicinal purposes only. I have been saying that about Guinness for years.
As the rigours of Lent begin to bite we can be sorely tempted to let our sights drop in a similar fashion. Fasting and abstinence are difficult things to do. When a major religious festival, like the Annunciation of Our Lord to the Blessed Virgin Mary, more conveniently known as “Lady Day”, occurs just when we have steeled ourselves to the thought of giving up something which we really enjoy, the soft option is to have a day off and celebrate.
That is not the thing to do. The law is the law as far a smoking pot is concerned. It may improve your singing, or make the sermon sound interesting, but you can still go to jail for two years if you are caught doing it. Lent is Lent, forty long days, excluding Sundays; there is no let up, neither are there any extenuating circumstances, days off for Holy Days of Obligation, or backsliding because it is your birthday.
Our Lord did not take time out from his days of temptation in the wilderness because he wanted to go shopping or to visit his mother in Nazareth, neither can we, following in his footsteps, afford to make petty excuses. The road ahead is a hard and rocky one but the end result is worthwhile.
May God bless you all, Fr Allan
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