Lenten Season of Peace – J.P.I.C. from Carolyn Townes
Greetings of peace, my dear Franciscan Family!
I pray this finds you well and filled with the peace of the Lord! 
Prettier copy of this letter (2020 Lenten Letter to NaFra)
Well, it is that glorious time of year again! Our Seraphic Father Francis said that for us, Lent is all year round.. And for these six weeks, Holy Mother Church will share it with us!
During Lent, we are asked to devote ourselves to doing three things: to seek the Lord in prayer and Scripture reading, to serve by giving alms, and to sacrifice self-control
through fasting (USCCB). I humbly invite us to faithfully and mindfully observe all three.
The Holy Father, Pope Francis tells us, “the celebration of the Paschal Triduum of Christ’s passion, death and resurrection, the culmination of the liturgical year, calls us yearly to undertake a journey of preparation, in the knowledge that our being conformed to Christ is a priceless gift of God’s mercy.”
In your journey to being conformed to Christ, please find attached some goodies to assist you during these six weeks. Again, I include my Lenten Season of Peace for you and your fraternity members to mindfully fast and feast. I also include Lenten calendars from the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB), USCCB 2020 Lenten Calendar, Creation Justice Ministries, cjm_2020_lent_calendar and the Michigan Interfaith Power and Light, mipl 2020 lenten calendar who have created a Plastic Fast calendar. There is also a Lenten Reflection Guide from the Maryknoll Office of Global Concerns lentenguide2020 Maryknoll. I invite you to check out more Lenten resources from the USCCB http://www.usccb.org/prayer-
“… I was thirsty and you gave me drink…” (Matthew 25:35)
Article 15 of our Holy Rule states: “Let them individually and collectively be in the forefront in promoting justice by the testimony of their human lives and their courageous initiatives. Especially in the field of public life, they should make definite choices in harmony with their faith.”
Our Holy Father exhorts: “Almsgiving, whereby we escape from the insanity of hoarding everything for ourselves in the illusory belief that we can secure a future that does not belong to us. And thus to rediscover the joy of God’s plan for creation and for each of us, which is to love him, our brothers and sisters, and the entire world, and to find in this love our true happiness.”
One such courageous initiative where we can give alms is our annual Lenten H2O Project, an international project to promote Christian solidarity, advocacy and financial support for poor communities in developing and under-developed nations who have no access to clean drinking water.
For two weeks in Lent, abstain from drinking any beverage except water – preferably tap water, and set aside any money normally spent on sodas and Starbucks. In solidarity with our brothers and sisters who do not even have clean water to drink, we increase our connections, awareness and responsibility to poor communities and God’s Creation. You can choose to give individually or collectively with your families, fraternities or faith communities.
Please send all contributions to the H2O Lenten Project 2020, c/o Claudia Kauzlarich, 2007 Maverick Trail Harrisonville, MO 64701-1545. Make the check payable to OFS-USA; with H20 Project in the memo line. And thank you for your generous contributions.
SAVE THE DATE: We are gearing up for our National Justice, Peace and Integrity of Creation Gathering, at the St. Maximillian Kolbe Shrine in Libertyville, IL, beginning with dinner on Thursday, May 7th and concluding on Sunday, May 10th. And yes, we realize this is Mother’s Day weekend. Spend time with Our Lady, Mother Mary; St. Maximilian had a special devotion to Our Lady! Watch your inbox for more details.
Thank you all and I wish you a very blessed and peace-filled Lenten season!
Take a Mindful Franciscan Pause to Thwart Bias
Carolyn Townes, OFS, national animator for Justice, Peace and the Integrity of Creation
Matthew (13:54-58) recounts how, when Jesus came to his hometown and began to teach in the synagogue, people were as- tounded, and even took offense. They knew him as the carpenter’s son; not this new Jesus.
“This image of him in the synagogue did not fit the Jesus they had in their heads,” Carolyn Townes, OFS, told National Chapter attendees. They couldn’t reconcile the image of the Je- sus they knew with the one standing before them, said Townes, national animator for Justice, Peace and Integrity of Creation and a member of the International Commission for JPIC.
It reminded her of a quote by George Bernard Shaw: “The only man I know who behaves sensibly is my tailor. He takes my measurements anew each time he sees me. The rest go on with their old measurements and expect me to fit them.”
A person in the latter case preserves an image as a way of keeping his thoughts in harmony. The harm in this selective perception is that it becomes the basis of bias; that is, a preference for or against a group or individual, Townes said.
“It can be positive or negative. Conscious or unconscious. Assumptions and stereotypes. It can be based what we iden- tify as labels — skin color, ability, age or gender preference.
“Unconscious bias is far more prevalent than conscious prejudice and is often incompatible with one’s conscious val- ues,” she noted. This makes bias in oneself harder to identify, especially when working under time pressure or in a per- ceived threatening situation, Townsend said. In those cases, we react automatically with what we already know. As a result, we use shortcuts based on prior knowledge to process the 11 million pieces of information coming at us at any one time.
For example, Townes used some sentence starters that members of the audience automatically answered:
“An eye for an…”
“What goes around…”
“Fight fire with…”
“Better late than…”
“An apple a day…”
“Birds of a feather…”
“Let sleeping dogs…”
Responses to these are part of the millions of bits of information that are stored in our subconscious mind.
“We have heard them so many times, we don’t even need to think about the answer,” Townes said.
This type of thinking can lead to snap judgments while making important decisions.
“This leads to hiring someone based on our personalpreference and not on the candidate’s skill. It also causes us to cross the street when we see someone as threatening.”
Our minds formulate shortcuts to make it easier and faster to make decisions. If these are based on biases, preferences against groups or individuals, they need to be changed.
“Two things I want you to know about biases. Number one, everyone has them. Number two, they can be disrupted or changed,” Townes said.
How do we reverse our biases?
“Ask yourself: Why am I so dead set on maligning this person? What if I took an opposite view?”
First, pause. “As Franciscans, we are called to pray for right judgment and right decision. Before you make a judg- ment based on that subconscious judgment in your head, take a Franciscan pause. We form our impression of a person in that first millisecond. Remind yourself that you are aware of your first impression.”
“Second, when you know you already have an image in your mind, make yourself come up with two pieces of opposite information about that image.”
“Third, define your inner focus. Once you become aware of your bias, do your counter activity until it becomes habitual. Do it mindfully, with prudence, caution and right judgment.”
“Fourth, be curious and cultivate conversations. Conversations help us find what we have in common,” Townes said.
Townes cited Article 19 of the Rule as a way of changing our bias. She calls it “taking a Franciscan pause.”
“Mindful that they are bearers of peace which must be built up unceasingly, they should seek out ways of unity and fraternal harmony through dialogue, trusting in the presence of the divine seed in everyone and in the transforming power of love and pardon…”
https://secularfranciscansusa.org/2020/02/28/take-a-mindful-franciscan-pause-to-thwart-bias/