For many of us, the journey through Lent each year is familiar.

Perhaps too familiar, leaving us complacent, confident that we've "been there, done that." Our prayer is that we all may be humble enough, open enough, to hear the story afresh, to realize how little we understand, and to wonder anew at the depth of God's love for us in Jesus Christ.

A simple image, from a poem by Mary Oliver, helps me to step back, to step out of these mental traps:

So let us approach Holy Week with humility and reverent wonder, with poetry and prayer, not slide-rules or calculators. Remember: when Nicodemus came to Jesus looking for explanations, Jesus responded with metaphor, pointing to mystery: “The wind blows where it pleases; you can hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going” (Jn 3:8, Jerusalem Bible). In other words, “You know almost nothing.”

*Rule of Benedict, Prologue.

In the early ‘90’s when I took a 3-year Enneagram Professional Certification course with Don Riso and Russ Hudson, I achieved some proficiency in the core beliefs and applications of the Enneagram and its dynamic components. An amazing system to identify spiritual and personal qualities, it is especially useful for inner work.

After teaching it and using it in Spiritual Direction for 25+ years, last month I took a 7-week course with Russ Hudson on The Ancient Spiritual Origins of the Enneagram as a Path for Self-Discovery and Wholeness. Wow. I was amazed at a more fully developed Enneagram and the new emphasis on its ancient spiritual origins.

In spite of the Wow-factor of the Enneagram, I admit I know almost nothing. When I turn to spiritual themes of the passion of Jesus, I know almost nothing. Sure, I’ve read the scriptures, waved palm fronds on Palm Sunday, and “walked” the Stations of the Cross. It was only in 1999 when I walked the Stations at Picture Rocks Retreat Center in the Saguaro National Park, part of the Sonoran Desert near Tucson, that I first began to understand the meaning of Jesus’s Passion.

The Stations in the Desert are an arduous climb up craggy, rocky path. I stopped at the Fourth Station, Jesus Meets his Mother. I became immobilized as I understood that within hours of Jesus’s walk up Golgotha, his dead body would be laid in the arms of his grieving mother. Without fully understanding the impact of that moment, I later understood that that was the place I began significant inner work.

The beauty of the sacred scriptures is that even though we may spend a life-time studying the scriptures, we know almost nothing. An experiential understanding of the message of the scriptures – meant solely for us, requires repeated soul journeying to an open space where the divine Spirit will pour into us message and meaning. I pray this will be your journey during this Holy Week.

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