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| (Image: Jacqueline Durban) |
Today
is Shrove Tuesday, the final day of Shrovetide or the ‘Pre-Lenten
season’, which either lasts for three days or seventeen days,
depending on your point of view. This is a period of preparation for
Lent, which in itself is a preparation for Easter. I must admit that
I like the slow mindfulness of this coming into spring. I often
underestimate how much energy it takes to wake up from the dark and
becoming more aware of that movement; of the ending of Christmastide
at Candlemas, and then the intake of breath before Shrovetide and
Lent begin, is valuable. The more that we are able to mark the
holiness of our days the better.
The
seventeen day Shrovetide begins on Septuagesima
Sunday, the
ninth Sunday before Easter and the third before Ash Wednesday.
Septuagesima comes from the Latin word for ‘seventieth’, falling
as it does around seventy days before Easter. The
subsequent Sundays;
Sexagesima,
Quinquagesima,
and Quadragesima,
translate as ‘sixtieth’, ‘fiftieth’, and ‘fortieth’
respectively.
These
pre-Lenten Sundays were abolished as part of the liturgical calendar
by the second Vatican Council and ceased to be marked from 1970.
However, Septuagesima Sunday remains the first day of the carnival
season in many countries.
Carnival,
or
Mardi Gras,
is a period of public celebration, parades, and street parties; a
welcome opportunity to rejoice before the ‘stripping back’ of
Lent. Often
carnival involves ‘over-indulgence’ in alcohol, meat, and sweet
foods which will then
be
given up, which of course is the purpose of Shrove Tuesday, or
Pancake Day; a chance to use up the last of our flour, eggs, butter,
and sugar before Ash Wednesday begins. Another
facet of carnival is the wearing of masks and costumes, the stripping
away of individuality to allow for a deeper, collective experience.
Oliver Rafferty SJ, notes that carnival’s “most important social
function was as a highly ritualised challenge to the established
order of Church and State” and that, “this was often done under
the cover of anonymity and hence the need for the dressing up and
masking of participants. This essential element gave individuals
freedom to indulge in chaotic displays of anarchic behaviour which
sought to undermine the sanctimonious seriousness of ‘normal’
life.” Carnival then was an opportunity to confront the dogma of
religion and the strict monarchical hierarchy with a different
reality.
Carnival
might also be thought of as a sort of ‘wassailing’ of the year,
with the last of the winter spirits being driven out in
a cacophony of noise to
make way for the new, but
what that new might be is in many ways for us to choose.
In
Pieter
Bruegel the Elder’s
1559 painting on the theme, ‘The
Fight Between Carnival and Lent’, Carnival,
depicted as a rotund
king riding a barrel of beer, and ‘Lady Lent’, a
starving
nun with a beehive on her head (beehives being a symbol of the
church), joust
for dominance.
Here
are Carnival
and Lent as two manifestations of the human experience; plenty and
poverty, merrymaking
and moderation, chaos
and order;
springtime Oak and Holly Kings of
the human heart.
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| Pieter Bruegel the Elder’s 1559 painting, ‘The Fight Between Carnival and Lent’, Wikiart |
We
are really not very good at negotiating between extremes and so often
find ourselves going far too much one way or the other; Carnival and
Lent remind us to watch the path. Indeed, in Bruegel’s painting a
couple are being led between both along a path of light as though
being shown the dangers inherent in becoming too identified with
either way of being. We
all need our times of celebration and revelry, giddy with abundance
like the hedgerows of autumn. We all need our times of being stripped
back, waiting for new growth like the bare
earth before spring.
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| (Image: Jacqueline Durban) |
Whilst
we might feel inclined to turn away from the austerity of Lent and to
celebrate the liberation of Carnival, both have their dark and light.
Carnival was often associated with violence and with the
further pushing
aside of
the already
marginalised, although of course we must always consider who was
reporting such happenings. If
we are honest about ourselves though we will see that in many large
groups, liberated after being too long hemmed in, there is potential
for things to go too far. It
is this dark seam in rich strata of humanity that allows us to weave
the
crown of thorns again and again, for the migrant, the refugee, the
poor, the vulnerable, the scapegoated, the fox, the badger, the
cormorant, the Christ. This too we will consider in the weeks to
come, and Carnival, among so many things, is a reminder of what we
are capable of at our very worst.
Southwark Fair, which was held in September to coincide with the Feast of the
Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary had its delights, including a ‘Mr
Pinchbeck, who caused a tree to grow out of a flower pot on the table
and flower and bear fruit in a minute’, and
stallholders collecting money to help prisoners in the nearby
Marshalsea. Nevertheless, amidst much reported criminality, a woman
was trampled to death by the crowds in 1733, prior
to the Fair being banned in 1763.
Similarly,
there have been
many
attempts to ban carnival itself. In 743, the Synod of Leptines in
Belgium spoke out against the ‘excesses of February’, and dire
warnings were also issued in this period against people who attempted
to drive out winter via a ‘variety of less honourable acts’.
Confession
books from the period also tells us much about the activities of the
common people who were noted to dress as an animal or an old woman
during festivities in January and February, despite the severe
penance required. This
writing down of confessions in a book may explain where the name
‘Shrovetide’ comes from, as the original meaning in Old English
of ‘scrifan’, whose root is in the Latin, ‘scribo’, is ‘to
write’, but
has now come to mean ‘confess’, to be ‘shriven’, perhaps then
to ‘rewrite’ the book.
Moving
to the present day, we find the annual ‘Shrovetide football’
game, which takes place over
two days
in the rural town of Ashbourne in Derbyshire and have been played in
England
since the 12th
Century and
in Ashbourne since at least 1667. This game is played on a ‘pitch’
that is three miles long, stretching from one side of the town to the
other, and any number of people are allowed to join in with
birth in relation to the town’s river dictating whether one should
join the Up’ards or Down’ards team. The
game is characterised by much eye gouging, punching, and stomping,
shops and boarded up and parking in the main streets of the town is much discouraged! There are very few rules involved but, tellingly,
these include
the prohibition of murder or manslaughter, with ‘unnecessary
violence’ being frowned upon, the ball not being carried in a
motorised vehicle or hidden in a bag, coat, or rucksack, and the
avoidance of cemeteries, churchyards, and memorial gardens. Enough
said I think!
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| (football-origins.com) |
In
Bohemia in
the Czech Republic,
a Shrove Tuesday tradition sees a man dressing up as the
personification of ‘Shrovetide’ and whoever is able to snatch a
straw from his hat and place it under a hen is assured of a fine
batch of eggs in the spring.
As
for the,
perhaps by now welcome, peace and quiet of Lent, it
once would have made much practical sense to enjoy all our
persishable foods, such as meat and dairy, before the warming days of
spring, and
then to give meaning to doing without them until a new season of food
could be gathered.
It
would
also
give people of the land a chance to cleasnse through fasting and the
taking of spring tonics to wake up the body, mind, and blood.
This
finishing up of our winter larder is expressed in many ways. The
Syrian Orthodox church celebrate ‘Moonnu Nombu’ at this time, a
three day pre-Lenten fast which recalls Jonah’s three days in the
belly of the whale. In Byzantine and Orthodox traditions, ‘meatfare’
and ‘cheesefare’ Sundays are designated to help use up these
ingredients. In Russia and other Slavic countries, the week before
Lent is known as ‘Butter Week’. In
Iceland, this day is known as ‘Sprengidagur’, or ‘Bursting
Day’, and is characterised by the eatring of salted meat and peas.
The
word ‘carnival’ itself is said to come from the Latin, ‘carne
levare’, to ‘remove meat’. The
last three days of Shrovetide then are our final chance to use up all
of these foods (not forgetting ‘Fat Thursday the week before).
Shrove
Monday, also known ‘Rose Monday’ and ‘Merry Monday’, is known
by the name of ‘Collop’, or
‘Collopy’, Monday
in Britain. The ‘collop’ refers to the traditional meal of the
day; leftover meat, or ‘collops of bacon’, and eggs, although in
East Cornwall it is sometimes referred to as ‘Peasen’ or ‘Paisen’
Monday due to the local custom of eating pea soup on that day,
presumably
with bacon added. Interestingly,
Lithuania have a similar tradition of eating pea soup on the last day
of Shrovetide, Shrove Tuesday.
Known
in Britain, and elsewhere, as ‘Pancake Day’ and
in others as ‘Mardi Gras’, or ‘Fat Tuesday’, Shrove
Tuesday is filled with tradition.
Our
custom of eating pancakes on this day dates back until at least the
16th
Century, although the instruction to be ‘shriven’ is much older.
Church bells were traditionally rung on this day, the toll being
known as ‘the Shriving Bell’, both to call people to confession
and to remind everyone to start cooking their pancakes. Christianity
is full of mixed
messages!
‘Mob
football’ games are a feature of Shrove Tuesday festivities in some
towns, such as Ashbourne, mentioned previously, but also Alnwick in
Northumberland, Atherstone in Warwickshire, St
Colom Major in Cornwall, and Sedgefield in County Durham. In others
pancake races take place, thought to be inspired by a 15th
Century
housewife from Olney, Buckinghamshire, who was once so engrossed in
making pancakes that, when she heard the shriving bell calling her to
confession, she ran out of the house frying pan, pancake and all,
tossing
it to stop it burning in the hot pan! Pancake races still happen there, with only women allowed to join in and with the instruction to wear a bonnet and apron.
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| (Olney pancake race, Wiki Commons) |
In
Scarborough, it’s traditional for local people to skip over long
fishing
ropes from
the harbour
on this day, called by the town crier with a ‘pancake bell’. In
Whitechapel, Lancashire children, echoing many traditions of going
from house to house, visit local homes to ask, “Please, a pancake”
before being rewarded with sweets or oranges. At Westminster School
in London, the "Pancake Grease" is held, an event during
which the schoolmaster tosses a very large pancake over a bar that's
set to about 15 feet high. The children then
make
a mad scramble for the
pancake
and whoever emerges with the largest piece is the winner.
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| Choristers vs. staff and parents annual pancake race, Norwich Cathedral |
And
so, it seems that we begin our spring in the same spirit as we
journeyed through winter, with our traditions full of the invitation
to share what we have in unity and community, not to grasp or cling
with the thought that we might then not have enough, but to trust the
earth to give us enough, and freely; that what we give out will be returned
when we too have need. It
seems to me though that we are encouraged to trust less and less, to
instead blame, to scapegoat and point the finger, to believe that
everyone is out to take what we have and that it is our right to have
it, even at the expense of another. In
the invitation of our seasonal festivals we are shown both the best
and the worst that we can be and Shrovetide and Lent reveal that to
us in all the raw,
stripped
back, vulnerability
that we can bear and bare, and perhaps even more than that. We
may not like what we see but it is a blessing to be shown it. So,
this evening let’s rejoice in our pancakes, and I hope that there
will be far too many until we are full to bursting, and then let’s
let it all go; the grasping, the fear, the meanness, the blame, the
always wanting to be full, let’s turn the page of our confessional
and give ourselves up to the green things of spring. We can be so much better than we are. They are waiting
to help us rewrite the book.
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| (Image: Jacqueline Durban) |
References:
On Shrovetide ~
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shrovetide
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/shrive
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Septuagesima
https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/how-to-pregame-lent-septuagesima-carnival-and-shrovetide-56266
https://www.fisheaters.com/customsseptuagesima2.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shrove_Monday
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shrove_Tuesday
On Carnival ~
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carnival
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mardi_Gras
The Fight Between Carnival and Lent ~
https://www.thinkingfaith.org/articles/%E2%80%98-fight-between-carnival-and-lent%E2%80%99
On Moonnu Nombu ~
http://newandoldmonks.blogspot.com/2010/01/significance-of-nineveh-nombu-for-us.html
On 'Mob Football' ~
https://sports.yahoo.com/news/shrovetide-%e2%80%93-an-ancient--brutal-and-bloody-game-223015662.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Royal_Shrovetide_Football
Southwark Fair ~
http://www.exploringsouthwark.co.uk/southwark-fair/4593650298
