Note: The Gospel used for this homily comes from the scrutinies, year A.
***
Back in high school English, I’m sure many of us read Nathaniel Hawthorne’s tragic novel, The Scarlet Letter, a story set in the 17thcentury Puritan Massachusetts Bay Colony.
In the novel a young woman, Hester Prynne, becomes pregnant out of wedlock.
Shamed by her Puritan neighbors, Hester is forced to wear a scarlet “A” on her arm as a penance, reminding her and everyone around her that she’s a sinner.
Though Hester knows who the child’s father is, she refuses to reveal his identity, seeking to protect his reputation.
But at the end of the story as his identity is revealed, he confesses:
“Of penance I have had enough. Repentance, none at all.”
***
Concealing his identity all of those years was like a penance, a heavy burden he wanted lifted. But he didn’t have the courage to come forward publicly and admit his transgression.
In fact, it seems like he’d do it all over again; he didn’t regret his relationship with Hester, only his inability to embrace it.
“Of penance I have had enough,” he says.“Repentance, none at all.”
***
The truth is, there can be a world of difference between penance and repentance.
…between what happens on the surface and what happens in the heart.
***
In the Gospel, for example, Jesus encounters a woman at a well.
Like Hester Prynne, she bears her own type of “scarlet letter.” She’s been married five times and is now in a sixth relationship, meaning the previous five men likely rejected her.
The fact that she’s drawing water from the well at mid-day, the moment when the sun was burning brightest, reveals that she’s without many friends.
The other women in town probably judge her to be a promiscuous woman and want nothing to do with her.
They would’ve gone to the well together earlier in the morning when the day was coolest.
But this woman is alone.
Of penance she’s had enough.
But repentance, none at all.
***
Everything changes when she meets Jesus.
Unlike her judgmental neighbors, Jesus isn’t looking to make this woman’s life any more penitential; she already leads a lonely life. What he wants is for her to repent, to change her ways and start again.
Only then can she find a true share of human happiness.
***
And she does.
As the Gospel tells us, after her encounter with the Lord, she returns to town and speaks with the very people she avoided earlier in the day, telling them about Jesus.
She isn’t afraid of them anymore, because she’s not the person she used to be.
Something in her has changed.
***
So what about us?
How changed are we as a result of our Lenten practices?
Have we found ourselves growing in charity, being kinder, more patient, more empathetic towards our neighbors?
Have we experienced an increase in joy as a result of fasting and prayer?
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Or has the opposite happened?
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After 40 days of no chocolate, no Facebook, no coffee, and meatless Fridays, we can all say, “Of penance, I’ve had enough!”
But repentance???
***
If we find ourselves just going through the motions this Lent, making these small sacrifices simply out of obligation or with the wrong attitude, they will bear little to no lasting fruit in our lives.
It’s only when we embrace prayer, fasting, and almsgiving with a generous heart that we’ll truly be changed.
***
The good news is this:
If Lent hasn’t’ gotten off to a great start, we still have 4 weeks to go.
Let’s make it count, striving to make real spiritual growth.