James Davy, Blackburn Cathedral's assistant director of music, considers the usefulness of February 29 as a time to reflect on our own experience of Lent so far.

Today is a special day. It comes around only every four years - an 'extra' day in the year, then?

Well, not quite.

It is simply absorbed into our busy calendar and endless round of commitments, deadlines and activities.

If it were really an extra day, we could simply repeat a calendar day and use the 24 hours for our own purposes.

At this midpoint of Lent, as Christians, what should we consider using some (if not all) of that time for?

Perhaps on this 'extra day', it would be an opportune moment to catch up on where we are.

Lent is a part of our Christian journey, and not time out'; it is not a period in which we should act differently, only to return to the way we were before.

Should we not hope (even expect) to reach Easter Day somehow changed from the person we were on Shrove Tuesday?

Dare we even to hope to be improved, renewed by our Lenten devotions, and particularly through our sharing with Christ in his return from the wilderness to the events surrounding the consummation of his ministry in Holy Week?

When we recite the text of the Easter Anthems "as in Adam all died, even so in Christ shall all be made alive", will we be conscious of having died to sin at all?

It is a bit late at that point to wish that we had used Lent more creatively to help God (as much as we can) to fashion a better person in us, alive to God and his resurrected world.

All that is a long way off, but halfway through Lent as we are, it is worth remembering that Lent is a period of change; there is no one single moment where everything falls into place and we can relax until Easter.

That said, why not use a moment - five minutes, if that is all you have - on February 29 to take stock of your life - not just the spiritual parts either - and see; are you on the right lines?

There's still time to take up a Lent book, attend Wednesday night Compline or catch up on the series of sermons exploring the Eucharist and our relation to it (at the 9 & 10.30 am services on Sundays).

No, Christ didn't pop back from the wilderness for a quick break halfway through, and I'm not suggesting a furtive trip to the biscuit tin, but it would do us good to see where we are, where we would hope to be by Easter Day, and whether we might need to re-centre our aims to achieve our hoped-for change.

I suspect that given an extra 24 hours, preferably with good weather, we would be inclined to use it to get away from the stress and anxiety of day-to-day living, even just for a moment.

So why not do that, and following the suggestions of Sophie, Tom and other bloggers, pop into the Cathedral today and take stock of your life.

Who knows where it might take you?