The Second Week of Lent 2025 A Fox in the Henhouse

On the Second Sunday of Lent, we hear how Jesus was warned that Herod Antipas was out to get him. He was advised to run away and hide, to stay safe.  His response? “You tell that old fox I am doing the work I’m called to do and I’ll go wherever God wants me to go.” (In other words, I’m not going to run, hide, or play it safe.) Jesus goes on to describe what the Empire of his day was doing: killing prophets, stoning those that were sent to call it back to God. And then heoffers an alternative to that kind of oppression and violence—his way—that of a mother hen who tenderly gathers her chicks under her wings and protects them.  (Luke 13:31-35)

That contrast is just as potent today: tenderness vs. coarseness, vileness, and evil.  And we are seeing Empire respond today just as it did in Jesus’ day—when faced with tenderness, mercy, compassion, empathy, it attacks, demeans, and dismisses them with a viciousness that is shocking. (Remember how Bishop Budde required a 24-hour security detail because of the death threats she got after gently imploring the newly elected president to show mercy to frightened people? Or, closer to home, how our own governor has been singled out for vengeance and retribution, punished because she wouldn’t back down from protecting vulnerable Mainers?)

What does this have to do with us? We’re not the Bishop of the National Cathedral, or the governor of a state. We’re certainly not Jesus. But…as Diana Butler Bass recommends in this week’s “W” Lenten practice*…we are called to write. To tell the truth, even if it puts us at risk, even if it paints a target on our backs for Empire to aim at.

So this week, be brave. Tell the truth. Write!

During this second week of Lent, we’re inviting you to try the spiritual practice of writing. It could be…

• A letter to the editor
• Testimony before a committee of the state legislature (our website has an easy step-by-step guide )
• A subversive poem you post secretly in public places (the aisles of Target or Hobby Lobby?)
• A prayer you offer during worship
• An email to Senators King or Collins, Representatives Pingree or Golden
• A note to a friend or family member who says things that are hurtful or hateful about vulnerable neighbors—immigrants, trans kids, veterans, those living with a disability, the unhoused.

Like Jesus, if you’re threatened by the powers-that-be because of what you write, find the courage of a mother hen. Stand up and say, “Go tell that old fox I’m too busy doing what I’m called to do, and I won’t let his threats stop me from showing tender-hearted compassion to the people he’s bullying.”

*A reminder to subscribe to “The Cottage” by Diana Butler Bass for her Lenten series, A Lent of Wellbeing and Witness,https://dianabutlerbass.com/the-cottage/