A Brunswick Episcopal priest is exploring a new way to reach busy people at the start of the Lenten season.
On Ash Wednesday, the Rev. Lisa O’Rear-Lassen conducted an “Ashes to go” drive-through in front of St. Patrick Episcopal Church on Center Road.
The drive-through was open to anyone of any religion.
The Ash Wednesday liturgy is such a dismal downer. I can see how it wouldn’t appeal to young people at all. Going to church in the middle of the week is so…religious. The “Ashes to Go” alternative is much less painful, and much quicker.
And those silly Lenten customs on Sunday. No flowers, veiling the cross, silent processions, the Great Litany, not saying the Hebrew word for “Praise God.” Lent is not the Happy Church that we all like going to.
If those Jesus Seminar folks are right, and if Jesus was just another guy, who didn’t actually die on the cross, etc., then the only reason to have Lent at all is so that there can be Mardi Gras, and St. Patrick’s Day.
I believe this is what Dietrich Bonhoeffer referred as cheap grace.