In our Blackapino home – we are often mixing our flavors and our foods to match our family’s bi-racial background. I grew up on a steady diet of Filipino food such as Pancit, chicken adobo, and my dad’s Pinakbet. My husband on the other hand grew up eating collard greens, red beans and rice and his mama’s seafood gumbo.  In Filipino cooking – we’re about the onions, garlic, and ginger for fragrance. There are things I’m coming to learn about soul food that are very new to me. I’m learning the necessary combination is what’s called the Holy Trinity – bell peppers, onions, and celery. Certain dishes don’t work unless all three ingredients are popping, right?

Now our Lenten journey is a different kind of feast where I propose our Holy Trinity – are prayer, fasting, and almsgiving. And I know some folks really relate to food and cooking and others are happy to just receive what’s made.

These next several weeks we are asked to turn back to the Lord. There’s the great song “Hosea" with the lyrics – “Come back to me with all your heart. Don’t let fear keep us apart.” That fear is real when it comes to our relationship to God, isn’t it? I know I’m always asking myself ‘Am I doing enough? Do I need to step it up?’ – that line echos throughout almost everything I do.

And often times when Lent rolls around  - I’m a list maker with so many ideas and plans. I know parishes really work hard to invite people back into their spaces. And sometimes I find ‘all the things’ over whelming because it’s just too much to keep up with. But we hear in Joel that "For gracious and merciful is he, slow to anger, rich in kindness"…Slow to anger. What’s there to fear with someone who is slow to anger and rich in kindness? I imagine nothing. There’s nothing to fear.

These ingredients of prayer, almsgiving and fasting are set in a such a way to help prepare our hearts and minds on this Lenten journey. Our almsgiving needs to be done in a way that our left hand can’t know what our right hand is doing. Our prayer is to be done in a way where we go to our inner room, close the door and pray to God in secret. Our fasting means we anoint our head and wash our face, so that you may not appear to be fasting.

Maybe these actions combined are the secret sauce to a transformative Lent. Now, I’m going to take this just a step further and encourage you to think about what it would mean for you to help others find their secret sauce for Lent? Where could you give of yourself so others may experience a deeply moving Lenten journey? Is it getting up earlier during the week to do household things to help your partner or spouse ease into the day while they take a moment for private prayer? Is it helping someone in your community get to a service or Mass once during these 40 days? Is it taking some of your lunch money and putting it toward a fund that is donated to a local food bank?

I’m going to go back to that image of a kitchen and food – because we’re talking about Ash Wednesday and maybe talking about fasting and food just makes sense. Often times when I’m in the kitchen making a complex dish  it’s very messy. My husband teases me because often times every pot and dish are used when I’m cooking. And it’s in that messiness that these beautiful meals of Seafood Gumbo and Pinakbet are created. Both dishes have complex flavors and textures of okra, shrimp, and tomatoes. Both have different aromatics for their base – and both are beautiful and dare I say messy. How do you believe God is inviting you into a Lenten journey that is uniquely beautiful and uniquely yours? What is God calling you back to?

How will your heart make its way home?

Come back to me with all your heart
Don’t let fear keep us apart
Trees do bend though straight and tall
So must we to others call

Long have I waited for
Your coming home to me
And living deeply our new life