“Remember that you are dust, and unto dust you shall return.” These were the softly spoken words of the female priest as she lightly drew the simple dark cross of ash on my forehead. This was the first time I had ever participated in an Ash Wednesday service, and I smiled at the floor as I walked back to my seat. The words of the priest echoed through my heart like the sound of singing in a cement stairwell. I did not feel anything overwhelming, but the words, like the sermon before it began to seep down through my soul to my feet, and made my them feel heavy. I could feel the pull of imaginary rootlets digging through the wood floor into the foundation of the church, the earth, the dust from which my body is made. I do not know about the resurrection of my body in some future paradise, about heaven; but I do know that my body resurrects, daily, minute by minute through the air, water and food that flows through me. Observing Lent, is not about giving up a marginally addictive substance or vice, it is the deep waiting before the blessed sacrament of spring, where the liturgy of Earth will perform itself again as it has over 4.5 billion years. Lent is the no-thing before the Great Flaring Forth of the universe 13.8 billion years ago. It is feeling speechless at the fact that ten thousand stars lived and died to forge the atoms that form my body so that I could watch a sunset, fall in love, or step into a church and sing praises back to the Process that meandered over eons before it said “Jason Brown.” Perhaps this is the purpose of ritual, to write our stories into our bodies and to knit those bodies into a blessed community.
3 Replies to “Ash Wednesday”
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I appreciate the depth of your connectedness to creation, your sense of belonging and your appreciation of your part in it.
My gosh, Jason! That’s just beautiful! What an incredible reflection. I grew up in the Catholic church and I loved the highly ceremonial masses, like Ash Wednesday. They always drew me back to the church, even years later, they still do. I have never considered Ash Wednesday and Lent in such a way – the no-thing before the burst of existence! And what a lovely time for this to happen. I know out there on the coast you’re all enjoying greenery, but here in Alberta that deep longing to see the soil, to plant those seedlings, to return to the earth is almost more than we can bear! Today, though, was a special blessing – the first day of + weather following an absolute deep freeze last week! The breaking forth is coming. All our little seeds are about to sprout within our hearts and within the soil!
I grew up in the same tradition, and even though ash on my forehead every year is a welcome act and sign, I ‘understood’ in a new way this year. Thinking back to Adam who was made out of the dust, I realize that both the dust and the human were declared ‘good’ by their Creator. This partnership is still good and the goal is a restored relationship with the dirt/dust out of which I am made. So the land and me – a recommitment to the dust! And living into the goodness of this gift! “Remember you are dust, and to dust you shall return.” “And it was (and is) good.”