A Lenten Reflection

Today is Ash Wednesday and the start of Lent. This year, it feels like a very short and intense journey to Easter, almost catapulted in from our joyous Christmas Celebrations.

I would like to thank the local villages and communities for warm-heartedly supporting the Services and the local teams for their hard work and hospitality. I think in every Church, ‘singing’ was so gloriously embraced – in Pockley Carol Singing around the Village; the Harome Ladies Choir astounding all at the Village Carol Service; at Nunnington, the newly formed Church Choir so beautifully leading the singing at the Carol Service – the soaring descants were searingly uplifting; Christmas Carols were heartily sung at Wombleton Village; the Family Carol Singing at St Hilda’s, illuminated by the glorious Advent Purple outside lighting and followed by mulled wine and mince pies at The Old Parsonage, and it was so heartening that both the Christmas Carol Service and the Christmas Eve Midnight Mass held at St Gregory’s were bustlingly full.

Mary, the most controversial of women

As we move into the realities of 2024, we are acutely aware of the great challenges and anxieties confronting the farming community as we gaze at the sodden fields and swollen rivers and becks. I think it breaks all our hearts to watch the daily news from Jerusalem and Gaza. In this way, I invite all to join me on Monday Evenings through Lent – either in person or by Zoom – to study Archbishop Stephen’s 2024 Lent Book ‘Godforsaken: The Cross, the greatest hope of all. Jesus’s last words on the Cross.’

As I contemplated the early Lent, I was drawn to ponder ‘Lady Day.’ Lady Day sounds more like Ascot or Wimbledon than a fixture in the Christian Calendar, but names can be deceptive. The Lady is Mary, the mother of Jesus, the most controversial of women, the real Madonna. Exactly nine months before Christmas, Lady Day celebrates the Annunciation when the angel Gabriel announces her conception of Jesus to Mary – so beautifully captured in the stained-glass window above the altar at St Saviour’s, Harome.

The Annunciation

My favourite picture of the Annunciation is by Simone Martini and Lippo Menni (above). Painted in the 14th century for the cathedral in Sienna, it now hangs in the Uffizi Gallery in Florence. Gabriel is kneeling before Mary, who slightly turns away. I once experienced an unexpected reminder of it, walking along in a quiet side street in London. Lost in my thoughts, I was taking little notice of the man and woman in front of me until he suddenly got down on one knee. As I walked past, I heard the magic words, ‘Will you marry me? ’I did not know the couple, but I still felt deeply the vulnerability in the air in the few seconds of silence before his astonished girlfriend turned to him and said, “Yes!”

Then it all clicked. The Annunciation is God’s proposal to Mary – that’s the message the angel brings. There’s the same vulnerability as we await Mary’s “Yes!” The Angel has to tell her not to be afraid before we hear her response, “Let it be unto me according to your word.”

What if fear had overcome her? What if Mary had said “no”? Imagine: God waited. She was free to accept or to refuse, a choice integral to humanness. Denise Leverton’s poem, Annunciation, goes on to challenge us: “Aren’t there annunciations of one sort of another in most of our lives?” Opportunities too often glimpsed and turned away from with relief as ordinary life continues?

Have the courage to say “Yes”.

Mary reminds us of the extraordinary possibilities in the courage to say “yes”. Over the years, there has been much theological debate about Mary as an impossible ideal and whether she could really be the ‘mother of God’, ‘God-bearer’ as opposed to simply the ‘mother of Christ’, the human aspect of God.

Lady Day asks us to think about the mystery of God, the mystery of femininity in relation to how we see God. It invites us to look again at Mary, maybe as strong and daring, not compliant and divisive. Mary’s “yes” to God’s proposal is what unites her with the divine and makes her “mother of God.” It is not an easy “yes” – the young Jewish maiden is afraid at the start and, in the end, has to watch her son die on the Cross. It is the “yes” that makes everything possible. Lady Day suggests we seize our opportunities for saying “yes” and perhaps as we take the Lenten opportunities to slow down, to reflect and ponder where in our lives God is inviting us to say “ Yes.”

A time to celebrate new life

In the midst of these poignant and troubled times, I pray that you know and experience Easter joy. We celebrate the new life and hope this season brings. Life is a precious gift of God to be used to the full.

The Lord bless you as you keep the Lenten season and fill you with his life and his love, for your own sake, in the service of others, and above all, to his everlasting glory.

With my love and prayers,

Sue
Rev’d Canon Sue Binks
Vicar

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