Dear People of St. David’s,
Well, we’ve eaten our pancakes, we’ve had ashes imposed on our heads, we’ve prayed the fifty-first psalm, we’ve put away the “alleluia’s,” and we’ve changed the vestments to purple. Lent has arrived once more.
Lent is, as we all know, a season of penitence where we seek to repent for the wrongs we have done, and the things that we should have done but failed to do. Before we can repent of our sins, however, we first must ask ourselves what sins we’re repenting of. Thus, before Lent can really be a season of penitence, it first must be a season of introspection and reflection.
One resource that I find helpful for self-reflection is the Litany of Penitence from the Ash Wednesday liturgy which begins on page 267 in the Book of Common Prayer. It’s of manageable length, but reasonably broad. I read through each of the sections of the litany and ask myself: “How do I participate in these sins in my own life?” Another resource that is far more detailed and encompassing is the “Self-Examination” from St. Augustine’s Prayer Book, which is published by Forward Movement Press. It follows the structure of the Seven Deadly Sins and breaks each of them down into their constitutive parts. This resource also allows the reflective question: “How do I participate in these sins in my own life?” I recommend both of these resources to you as a part of your Lenten journey.
In my experience there are several pitfalls to understanding sin, and ourselves as sinners. Of course, there’s the obvious minimization and rationalization that we can all fall prey to: It’s not that bad. Others have done worse.
Some of us try and bargain with God, seeing our lives as some sort of giant Excel spreadsheet, where of course we have some “red” in our columns, but we also have some “green” there too: I do some things I shouldn’t, but I go to church. I helped last week at the soup kitchen. Those things should make up for everything else.
There’s also the tendency that some of us must overemphasize ourselves as sinners and beat ourselves up: I’m a terrible person. How could God love me? I’m a lost cause.
Perhaps the greatest pitfall we fall into today is seeing sin as only the things that we do individually, and not as the things we do collectively. In the Bible, and especially in the Old Testament, sin is addressed over and over again as something God’s-people-as-a-whole are guilty of. When God gives the Law to the Israelites in the Torah, it’s the Law for the whole nation. Many of the commandments are about what individuals are to eat (or not), wear (or not), organize their household (or not). But around 30-40% of the laws in the Torah are about how the whole nation is to organize itself, treat others, and orient themselves. When the Assyrians destroy the northern kingdom of Israel in 622BC, and the Babylonians destroy the southern kingdom of Judah in 586BC—both are seen in the Scriptures as judgements on the whole nation, not particular individuals within that nation. When the prophets rail against sin in the latter pages of the Old Testament, they are mostly addressing the whole nation, and not just particular people in the nation—unless that particular person happens to be the king.
The sins we are collectively responsible for get lost in a Christianity that detaches its mooring to the long story of the Bible and only sees sin as something that is just between me-and-God. Even Jesus, in Matthew 25 proclaims judgement on the nations for their failure to live according to the precepts of the Kingdom of God.
If that is the biblical witness, then our Lenten self-examination cannot stop at the borders of our own private morality. Yes, we must ask where we have spoken harshly, failed to pray, neglected the poor in front of us, or nurtured resentment in our hearts. We must also ask harder questions: How have we — as a people, a family, a church, a nation—participated in sins against God and our neighbor.
This kind of reflection is more uncomfortable because it is less tidy. Personal sins can feel manageable: confess, repent, amend life. Collective sin implicates us in ways that are harder to measure and harder to fix. Yet the tradition of the Church has always known that sin operates both personally and corporately. The Litany of Penitence in the Prayer Book itself names not only “the evil we have done” but also “the evil done on our behalf.”
Lent invites us into the humility to hold both truths at once.
We are not merely isolated individuals standing alone before God. We are members of households, communities, and nations. We shape them, and they shape us. Repentance, therefore, is not only about private sorrow but about renewed vision—learning to see the world, and our place in it, more truthfully.
The good news, of course, is that the Church never calls us to repentance just to leave us in despair. The ashes placed on our foreheads are traced in the shape of the cross. From the very beginning of Lent, repentance is already oriented toward mercy.
So, as this holy season unfolds, I encourage you to engage in the traditional practices of self-examination. Sit with the Litany of Penitence. Work slowly through careful examination of conscience. Notice where the Spirit brings conviction—and where the Spirit brings surprising freedom.
Resist the easy outs: The minimizing voice that says, “it’s not that serious”; the bargaining voice that says, “my good cancels out my bad”; and the despairing voice that says, “I am beyond help.”
Instead, allow Lent to do its deeper work: to tell the truth about sin in all its dimensions, and to tell the even deeper truth about the wideness of God’s mercy.
Because the goal of Lent is not better self-criticism. The goal of Lent is a more honest heart, a more open life, and a repentant people more fully turned toward the Kingdom of God. And that is work worth entering into. Together.
The Rev. Rick Morley
Rector
Published on February 20, 2026.
Editor’s Note: If you’re interested in hearing more about Ash Wednesday and Lent, we invite you to listen to this week’s Cross Connections podcast episode, “Myth-busting Ash Wednesday and Lent.”