The time is coming, as it does every year, when we approach the Season of Lent. For many of us, Lent is, traditionally, the season of penitence and giving something up. Often, our Priest or Pastor will have a specific theme or practice that they want to stress during the season, whether it is rosary prayer, confession, more regular attendance at Eucharist; there is, generally, a theme for the season every year.

As I sit at my desk pondering Lent and what discipline I would like my congregation to practice over the 40 days, I can’t help but think about what the past 2 years have brought with them. Yes, there is COVID-19, but there seems to be an attitude or spirit of intolerance and division that has grown increasingly hostile. Regardless, whether it is political division, vaccination division, or racial division, we are more and more divided, more convinced of our rightness and their wrongness, whoever “they” are.

Our nation, and even our own little city, is becoming more and more cracked and broken under the strain of our divisiveness. For our own divisiveness, those whom Christ has asked us to minister to are the ones feeling the hurt and the strain of it all. The poor and the sick seem to be the ones left behind as we entrench ourselves into our own viewpoints and our own ways of seeing things.

As I sit and ponder these things leading up to Lent, I am also drawn to the Gospel of John. Specifically, Jesus’ prayer for his disciples in John chapter 17:22: “…so that they may be one as we are one” (NSRV). Of course, Jesus is speaking about his disciples, but I can’t help but think that the prayer extends to us as well, even here in Kingman Arizona, that we may be one. Yes, we are going to have our own political, religious, and medical opinions and wants, and there is nothing wrong with that, but that we may let go of our own “rightness”, our divisiveness, and do what is best for all of us, even at an individual level.

My hope for this Lent is that we as a Church and we as a community can begin to heal our wounds whether they are political, emotional, or spiritual and come together as one community, one city, to make Kingman a better place to be. My hope is not that we have a Lent of misery and penitence, but a Lent of growth into each other as one community and take away the heartache and pain of those less fortunate around us, regardless of why they are less fortunate. My hope is that we all embrace a spirit of healing, not just for ourselves, but for each other, and if we can heal each other we will become a stronger and better community to live in.

Ben Rodenbeck is the Vicar of Trinity Episcopal Church in Kingman, AZ.