Dean DeLiza Spangler, St. Paul's Cathedral

The writer Philip Yancey recounts that a colleague of W.C. Fields once caught the self-professed agnostic reading the Bible. "Embarrassed, Fields snapped the book shut and explained, ‘Just looking for loopholes.'" "Probably," Yancey comments, "he was looking for grace."  (What's So Amazing about Grace, p. 35)  

Neither Scripture, nor our faith as a whole, are about "loopholes," about "getting by" with something. Rather, our faith is about moving toward something.

It is in giving that we receive; it is in pardoning that we are pardoned;
and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.

St. Francis of Assisi

I have known people who completely rearranged their lives to care for a loved one who needed special care of some kind. The made special changes in their living arrangements, career and daily schedule for the specific purpose of caring for someone else. In one case, a person that I know made all of these changes, including moving to a different city, for a total stranger! What is often said regarding this kind of sacrifice is that the giver is generally the recipient of the blessing – more than the one receiving the care. 

I write this as an introduction to a response to the most asked question I receive regarding Lent: What Shall I give up?