'OH NO, IT'S THE GREAT FAST, AGAIN'!! ~ It's an understandable reaction if we are being honest! I don't think that prostrations, fasting or penance are something that anyone looks forward to, but it is precisely because we are looking forward, - or rather that God is looking forward on our behalf, that we now enter the desert of Great Lent - with all our brothers and sisters in all 'the Holy Churches of God' throughout the world! It is because we are all looking forward to the feast of Pascha, to the great Wedding banquet of Easter, and because God is looking forward to celebrating that banquet with us and for us, that we choose to enter the fast, to enter the desert.

For Jesus, the journey to the desert followed fast on the heels of his baptism in the Jordan. For us too, the Great Fast follows quickly after our celebration of Theophany, and after Jesus had heard the Father's voice calling him his Beloved Son, so we too, in the awareness of our own identity as the Father's beloved sons and daughters, now need to enter the desert also, to better learn through the Fast our own identity in God, and to better experience for ourselves the Father's calling and the Father's love.

In calling his chosen nation to himself, using the language of a marriage proposal, God describes the call into the desert as a preparation for the intimacy of the wedding chamber:



As the people of God, we now enter the desert. It is God himself who leads us there with all the ardor and determination of a suitor wooing his beloved. He leads us into the desert and into the Fast in order to speak to us tenderly, in order to betroth us to Himself forever.

The desert, the wilderness, the fast, this can be where we best pray and where we best hear the voice of God for ourselves. In the middle of the Sahara desert, Fr. Carlo Carretto wrote: At night…time passes here unhampered by haste or clock. No obligations pester you, no noise disturbs you, no trouble awaits you; time is all yours. You satisfy yourself this way with prayer and silence while the stars light up in the sky. (Letters from the Desert). A beautiful image and ideal maybe, but one we must seek after, even in the city, even in the busyness of our lives.

After consulting with other clergy and with members of the Parish Advisory Council, Pani Amanda and I will therefore be opening our home each Wednesday evening at 6pm for a potluck meal and for a study of the weekday readings from the Prophet Isaiah prescribed by the Church for the Great Fast. This will be a change-up to our Lenten schedule from previous years, but one which I pray will benefit us in terms of deeper community, deeper intimacy with God in prayer, and help us more deeply experience that "in the sacred books, the
Father who is in Heaven comes lovingly to meet his children, and talks with them." (Vatican II / CCC 104)

We will follow the reflections written by my scripture professor and former dean of studies at the Byzantine Catholic Seminary, Fr Jack Custer, in his booklet “Rejoice Isaiah - A Lenten Journey with the Prophet" which is available from ecpubs.com - https://ecpubs.com/product/rejoice-isaiah/

It’s no accident that the words “Rejoice Isaiah” are also the opening line of a solemn tropar from the marriage service – as I said earlier – it’s for a wedding feast that we are now preparing ourselves! When the Bridegroom comes at Pascha, may all of us be found ready for the banquet, each wearing beautiful wedding garments!!

Blessings to all of you! Please don’t hesitate to contact me personally if you have any questions. ~ Fr Adam.