A WILD AND WILDER PLACE (Lent 2026)

In preparation for Lent, the question I am asking myself is, "what would Jesus do, what would He have me do?" And St. Paul in Philippians chapter 2 tells us to have the mind of Christ in us, to think like Him and St. Vincent Pallotti tells to act as Jesus would in each moment, in every situation. So, this is the basic goal.

February 18th is Ash Wednesday. Fifth anniversary of the death of my friend Father John O’Brien. Birthday of my friend Father John Fitzpatrick who died last August.

A significant day for a new chapter in my life. The sabbatical has come to an end. I will be based in Pallotti House, Dundrum and helping out in Shankill for the time being, until a more permanent path opens up. And I am happy with the transience of this period, not in a hurry for permanence.

This offers me some kind of balance between my desire for a solitary, contemplative life, and my desire to be engaged in parish life at some level. An engagement without the burden of responsibility, an engagement with the essentials of priesthood, engagement with the lives of ordinary people.

There’s a gap in me. There are many gaps. Contradictions. Conflicting pulls.

The gap between patience and impatience; between waiting and being in a hurry. In activity, in driving I am impatient to get things done, to move forward and find myself frustrated by the slowness of others. Find myself saying in my head, “would they ever get on with it!”

On the other hand, I want to be allowed sit with uncertainty, unanswered questions, delayed responses, unplanned moments, unsolved problems. And not have them solved, for there are times when you and I  must go alone and uncertain into the unknown, as Jesus Himself did.

A deeper frustration is the slowness that has emerged in myself, the fumbling, the inability to do things as quickly as before. Skills that once came easily no longer do.

The biggest gap of all is the huge hole that my departure from Hastings has created in me, an emptiness yet to be fathomed, not yet dealt with. It's tucked away in the box that contains all the cards given me there. An emptiness deep inside, as Neil Diamond sings. An emptiness that gives me an empathy, a feeling for the emptiness that I sense in others too. Emptiness that is ripe to be filled with God's tender and powerful grace.

And maybe this is the real desert to be faced, the wilderness to be entered into for Lent. The people of the Sahara told us that the desert is God's Garden, a place where life seems to be dead and yet it is a place of Springtime where life is already bursting forth. There are crocuses in the frost, there is a single flower in dry soil. There is life.

My soul always aches at this time of year, aching in anticipation for what is yet to emerge. Daffodils in bud. The temptation is to pluck the daffodils, put them in a vase of water, forcing them to bloom before their time. The secret is to wait for them to bloom in their own time. The secret of life is to let nature take its course.

Being at home these past few months has been a great refuge, shelter from the storm, preparation for this future still unknown.

So, all this is material for Lent. How to find the right path. It’s like the space between the river and the desert. Being in that space now. Jesus coming up out of the waters of Baptism and then being driven by the Holy Spirit into the desert. Driven suggests a certain kind of unfreedom, like it’s something that was chosen for Him. Not that He would be reluctant as I might be! But there is something here for me to let go to, to allow the Spirit to lead and drive me where I might not wish to go.

The desert of Jesus is sometimes named as wilderness. A powerful word. I heard Liam McClarey break it down in Hastings a couple of years ago. Wild. Wilder. A wild and wilder place. The Gospel tells us that, out there, Jesus was with the wild beasts. He was with them. Not against them. They were not the enemy as we might expect. Of course not, because Jesus, through whom all things came into being, is at home with all of His creatures, including the wild beasts. The one enemy is Satan, and it is with him that Jesus enters into battle.

Being with the wild suggests that the wild in me, in us, is also with Jesus. He is at home with those aspects of our personalities that we often fear and simply want to get rid of or simply avoid. This season of Lent offers us that opportunity to allow our own wildness to be with Jesus, to let our wild be led and driven by the Holy Spirit. And tamed by that same Holy Spirit that makes it even more lively than it ever could be in its untamed state.

It is one of the remarkable features of the presence of Jesus that nature comes to peace in His presence, the storm is calmed, the beast is tamed.

Bishop Martin Drennan of Galway, God rest him, invited us to move from our restless and distracted ways of living to a reflective stillness in which we allow our monsters to show themselves and instead of fighting them to learn how to tame them. This is exactly what Jesus did in the wilderness of the desert. It is what we are called to in the holy season of Lent. Daunting, but well worthwhile.

There is freedom in what is wild, the wild that has been tamed; there is a gift in it. Freedom in the gift given.

I’m tight with money, with what I spend, cautious. Never willing to spend foolishly or unnecessarily. But recently I was given a book voucher and headed off into Eason’s to spend it. €25. I would not usually spend that amount on a book but something in me suggested that I could be a bit reckless, so I saw a book that cost €29. Poems and Prayers by Matthew McConaughey.

It struck me that, with the gifts of God, I am also tight, unlavish, and cautious, as if I might lose something in the spending. But gift suggests freedom, a lavish spending and maybe even recklessness. And this too is material for Lent. How to break out of that caution, even meanness of spirit that I detect in myself. This is something for the Holy Spirit to lead and drive. And there is nothing freer, more untight than the Holy Spirit of God. The abundant, lavish Spirit.

"I remind you to fan into flame the gift of God, which is in you..." (2 Timothy). Fanning into flame is anything but tight or cautious. So let it flame!

In it all I welcome the companionship of Mary, spouse of the Holy Spirit, who is described by Gerald Manley Hopkins as, "wild air, world mothering air, nestling me everywhere." May the wind if the Spirit blow strong in us all.