Dude, what’s that on your forehead?
Wednesday, February 21st, 2007I always watch Edward Burns movies because there’s just something about him I love. And the way he pokes fun at Catholic-flavored wrong-headedness is plain adorable to me. One of my favorite exchanges in She’s The One was near the end of the movie where Ed’s character says something like, “But you don’t even believe in God,” and his father answers, “That doesn’t mean I stopped being a good Catholic.”
I didn’t really enjoy Ash Wednesday, though. Well done, certainly, in its darkness, but it just didn’t make me feel good. Through the whole movie, all I wanted was for him to wash his face. My OCD was kicking in, and I kept rubbing my forehead, trying to get the ashes off.
So, today is Ash Wednesday, representing the beginning of Jesus’s 40 days in the desert. And in honor of those 40 days, we make a symbolic self-sacrifice, focusing on the fasting and harsh conditions he endured because maybe in this small way we can be like Jesus.
I gave up something for Lent once. In my freshman year in college, my roommate was like a real Catholic, so she gave up something every year, and she inspired me to try it out. I gave up naps. For a whole 40 days, I didn’t take a single nap.
But like every good Catholic, I used a certain amount of bargaining. It didn’t count as a nap if I woke up after spending the night at my boyfriend’s apartment, then drove back to the dorms and went back to sleep. That was just going back to sleep. And I certainly wasn’t giving up the sex.