As we journey in the season of Lent, my heart aches for those who are struggling, and I am moved to reflect deeply…
A Reflection: The Lenten Desert of the Dispossessed
As we receive the ashes on Ash Wednesday, we are reminded that we are dust. But for your flock, Father, this is no symbolic gesture. The dust is the grit of the road they travel as internally displaced persons; the ashes are the remains of ancestral homes scorched by conflict. While the world enters a “voluntary” desert of self-denial, your people have been driven into a literal wilderness by the sound of the gun.
In this context, the traditional Lenten pillars of prayer, fasting, and almsgiving take on a harrowing, almost skeletal form. How does the hungry man fast? He does not “choose” to abstain; his entire existence is a forced fast. His hunger is not a spiritual exercise but a visceral cry for justice. For the poor, fasting is transformed into the sacrifice of endurance. Their “hidden sacrifice” is the quiet dignity they maintain while their stomachs are empty, and their hearts are heavy with the names of siblings lost to abduction.
How do they give alms? They have already given the ultimate alms: the ransom for a loved one’s life, the loss of their land, and the sharing of their meager crumbs with a neighbor in the refugee camp. This is almsgiving from “want” rather than “surplus.” It is the widow’s mite multiplied by a thousand tragedies. Their prayer is not found in long liturgies, but in the wordless groanings of the Spirit amidst the trauma of displacement.
As a pastor, what do you have? You may feel you have no bread to multiply and no power to silence the guns. But you have the Ministry of Presence. Like Mary at the foot of the Cross, you are called not to explain the suffering, but to stand within it.
How to Shepherd in the Shadows:
Validate their Lent: Remind them that Jesus’ own Lent ended in a state of “abduction” and “displacement” on the Cross. Their lives are currently a living liturgy.
Redefine Sacrifice: Teach that their patience in the face of loss is the “hidden good” that God sees. While the “haves” give what they can spare, your flock gives what they cannot afford to lose.
Be the Voice: If they must suffer in silence to stay safe, you must be the “hidden advocate” who cries out for their daily bread and their returned kin.
In this season, the joy of hidden sacrifice is found in the radical hope that even when the world looks away, the Father who sees in secret is weeping with them, holding every ransom note and every memory of the slain.
May this reflection guide us towards compassion, understanding, and solidarity with those who suffer. May our Lenten journey be marked by a deeper commitment to standing with the marginalized, and may our actions be inspired by the hope that in the midst of darkness, God’s presence shines brightly. Amen.
By Sylvester Ponjé MHM
