A fitting Lent

This is the fifth time I will be pregnant during the holy season of Lent, yet the first time I will deliver my child before Easter arrives. I was recently struck by the significance of this in a circuitous way.

Patrick mentioned while we were prepping breakfast for our family that “it didn’t really feel like Lent.” Immediately I assumed, wrongly, that he castigating me for having taken on no penances at all, and in my sensitive state, I nearly burst into tears right then. I'm fragile these days, what can I say?

Seeing my face, he quickly corrected himself and said he meant he was thinking of his own Lenten sacrifices. Instead, he suggested, I was let off the hook, so to speak, for this year.

That comment didn’t sit well with me, though. For someone who has a serious temptation to laxity and sloth, being patted on the head and promised the freedom to an even greater state of apathy seemed just plain wrong.

But is that why the Church absolves pregnant women from the obligation to fast? Have I been handed an “easy” Lent?

I thought about the powerful crescendo that is Lent. A little sacrifice here, a bit of extra prayer there, slip-up followed by more slip-ups from us weak followers of Christ, all the while building up to the holy, heart-wrenching liturgies of Holy Week. Suddenly I saw in a new way how this mirrors pregnancy so well.

The expectant mother goes through her own Palm Sunday through the excitement and adulation of friends and family. Perhaps this is expressed through extra attention, promises of prayers, or gifts to the mother and her child. On Palm Sunday our Saviour was lauded and honoured, while being mere days away from giving His whole life for the world. At a baby shower, the mother is pampered and fawned over, acting as a subtle but unmistakable counterpoint to the bloodshed of birth that is to come. She is the worthy recipient of gifts, but as a precursor for the gift she will make of herself.

The Holy Thursday of the hugely pregnant mother is seen through her efforts to fulfill her responsibilities while being utterly spent. She literally washes the feet, as well as the hands, faces and bottoms, of her other children, maneuvering awkwardly over the the edge of a bathtub. She lays down her own comfort for the good of the other.

At night, the pregnant woman enters the Garden of Gethsemane. Her whole family peacefully sleeps while she paces the floor and ruminates on the physical suffering to come. Of course, the joy of the new baby brings the promise of New Life, but first she must offer herself in a harrowing way.

“Take this cup away from me,” she prays, as insomnia allows her to keep vigil with the Saviour who sweat blood as He anticipated His cross.

Her Good Friday involves bringing forth life through immense pain. Offering it back to the Father as best as she can, she spills blood and tears for the salvation of souls. Whether groaning and pushing or lying cruciform in the OR, the mother gives herself in a sacrifice that brings forth life but looks and feels a lot like death. Her fears and sorrow, even anger and resistance, offered back to God rend the veil in the temple split; only a woman could offer a sacrifice so simultaneously generous and scarring.

So what Lent am I experiencing this year? A paltry one, in terms of self-selected penances. Yet when united with the drama of the Passion and the Promise of New Life, the most fitting of Lents awaits me.