Slow walk through Lent invites change

On Monday, my wife and I took an early morning walk on the trails at Barkhausen. It was a prayer, a Lenten practice and a dip into the blessings of God. Ordinarily, my wife and I walk at different paces, but on this day it was easy to hold hands and walk together.

The Isaiah scripture for this coming Sunday, "See I am doing something new! Now it springs forth do you not perceive it?" was inescapably being spoken by nature. At one point, we stopped in a maple grove, where the trees were tapped. We could hear the rhythmic drumming as the trees bled for someone's pancakes.

Lenten walking is not pre-occupied with destinations, but is a self-conscious act. The closest religious imagery is pilgrimage, but even that falls short of the spiritual potential of this Lenten practice.

This sort of walking is a prayer that wanders amid the landscape of our heartbreaks, loves, joys and sorrows. It can be done no matter age or geography. I have walked downtown Chicago like a prayer. The rhythm of this walking can heal the disjunction our modern life creates between the body, the mind and the spirit.

I like walking slow. I suspect that the mind, like my feet, works at about three miles per hour. If this is so, then modern life is moving faster than the speed of thought, or thoughtfulness. Some who know me as the frenetic flashy public speaker and father with Attention Deficit Disorder may find that hard to swallow, but I assure you it is true.

In fact, it is probably because there are so many distractions that I cannot walk fast. Like my dog, with whom I often meander, there are hundreds of smells that call out to me and for which I must stop. While my dog pursues the ground for God's trail, I get distracted and look up at the stars. When I look at the stars, I get distracted and think about my daughter who is studying the stars. I have always been confused by people who have difficulty finding God, when I smell trails of the almighty everywhere.

In this Sunday's Gospel, an impassioned group appears anxious to stone a woman caught in adultery. They call on Jesus for a judgement. Instead of responding clearly and concisely, Jesus stops to doodle in the dirt. Some think he was writing magic in the ground. I think he was just doodling and that fired tempers because they were in a hurry to have a quick effective stoning so they could then go shopping. I'm betting that's what pressed their hot buttons. Just like little kids, whose parents are all too eager to finally exit the zoo, but instead they want to see the monkeys again.

Parents fall into this trap a lot, because their lives are so full of agendas, stacked on agendas on hold. Parents live in a future built on agendas and kids are irritating because they live in the present. Maybe we parents are jealous. Lent should be a time to slow down, and doodle sweet nothings in the ground of our lives. I think God would consider that a prayer. I'll bet the church on it!

In the book Wanderlust: A History of Walking by Rebecca Solnit (Viking Press), she cites an Eskimo custom that offers an angry person release by walking the emotion out of his or her system in a straight line across the landscape; the point at which the anger is conquered is marked with a stick, bearing witness to the strength or length of the rage. I really like this idea! This would be a great alternative, for Attention Deficit people like me, to a retreat house. The diocese should purchase many acres to turn into into a walking field where we can walk off our rage. Whole families could go out into the field together, and go home even closer. Couples could use such a field to walk out grudges and emotional baggage that they never otherwise dealt with.

Wouldn't that be a remarkable way to teach children, at an early age, strategies on dealing with anger, disappointment and frustration? Each stick in the ground is a liturgical expression, the beginning of forgiveness both of self and another. Absolutely marvelous! Wow! Take a walk for Lent.

(Rinkoski is the Green Bay Diocese's Family Life director.)