It is never too late... to begin Lenten practices

WILMINGTON, Del. (The Dialog)- During the 40 days before Easter, Catholics are called to prepare for the resurrection by drawing closer to God or by renewing their relationship with him. Most parishes offer an additional daily Mass, penance services, holy hours of adoration, special lectures, or Stations of the Cross. But many Catholics devise their own, more personal Lenten practices.

When most families pass a basket at dinner, the children probably reach in to pull out a roll or a slice of bread. Every day this Lent, however, the four young children of Steve and Allison Girone of Bear will be rummaging, eyes closed, for slips of paper with the names of people for whom the family will pray that evening. The Girones, members of St. Margaret of Scotland Parish, use Lent for special prayers. Before Ash Wednesday, family members make a list of people for whom they will pray - everyone from the pope to school classmates, Allison Girone says. They write the names on slips of paper and place them in a basket. Every night at dinner before the family says grace, they pass around the basket and the children draw a name. The family then prays for those individuals' needs and intentions. "The names," Girone explains, "are then entered on the kitchen calendar and we send everyone a note or e-mail. We let them know what day they were chosen and that we prayed for them." Some of the recipients, Girone says, have responded that they particularly needed prayers that very day, because, for example, a family member was in labor or they were going through some personal trial. The activity is a way to make faith tangible for the family, Girone says. "Our children have been able to see God at work in this tradition." Shannon Quinonez, 33, of Holy Cross Parish in Dover, entered the Catholic Church two years ago. "My friends joked with me about giving up chocolate or soda or something," she says of the Lent before she entered the church. "But last year, instead of giving up anything, I worked on renewing my faith. This year I will use this time to deepen my relationship with God and strengthen my Catholic identity." That has become easier for Quinonez now that she works as an executive secretary at Catholic Charities in Wilmington. She finds it easier to read the Bible and the devotional magazine Magnificat during her lunch break, and she is usually able to slip away for the noon Mass the diocese offers employees three days a week. Like many Catholics, Anne Marie Conestabile of Ocean City, Md., sometimes finds it hard to follow through on her Lenten goals, including attending daily Mass, reflecting on spiritual readings, and increasing her awareness of the needs of the less fortunate. "No matter how much I think I possess steadfast convictions," she says, "the reality is that we live such fast-paced, overloaded lifestyles that it is virtually impossible" to do all she sets out to do. Like many Catholics, Conestabile started Lent by getting ashes on Ash Wednesday. While she hopes to engage in other traditional Lenten practices, she has something special planned. As coordinator of youth activities at St. Mary Star of the Sea-Holy Savior Parish, Conestabile will travel to Lithuania to speak to church officials, priests, seminarians and youth ministers about her parish's International Student Outreach ministry. The parish works each summer with thousands of young adults from Eastern Europe who come to the resort with the promise of good jobs and housing but who often find neither and end up lacking money for a return airplane ticket. Conestabile, a retired special-education teacher from Long Island, N.Y., will pay for the nine-day trip herself. She sees it as a time of sacrifice and penance, but she also knows it will bring the spiritual enrichment of her previous trips to former Soviet Bloc countries. Witnessing the extreme poverty but great faith of Catholics there, she says, is a great blessing. Catholics can find many guides for Lenten activities in religious bookstores or on the Internet. But rather than recommend titles, one local spiritual director suggests a simpler approach. "When people ask me, 'What shall I do to pray?' I ask, 'What do you do that brings you joy?'" says Sister Liz Sweeney, a spiritual director at Jesus House Prayer and Renewal Center in Wilmington. That might be taking a walk outside on a beautiful day, listening to a favorite piece of music, or spending a few minutes every day writing about two things for which you are grateful. "Another [helpful] thing for me is reading a poem alongside a piece of Scripture," Sister Liz says. "There's a book, 'Imaging the Word' [United Church Press, 1994], that has a poem, the daily readings and a piece of art. It helps me to see beyond. It lifts the spirit, and it gets you out of your head, away from the words and into your heart; that's how God touches you." For some, experiencing a few moments of joy amid the beauty of God's creation requires "an act of faith - believing that it's good enough for God," Sister Liz says. But spending a few minutes this way each day in Lent, she says, may develop into the spiritual habit of acknowledging God's presence more and more throughout life.

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This story was made available to Catholic Online by permission of The Dialog (www.cdow.org), the official newspaper of the Diocese of Wilmington, Del.