On Ashes

Once Wednesday a year, my grandmother would pick me up from school with a smudge on her forehead. She was usually the one who fixed me in my disheveled state, so it was odd one year to finally break the news to Gram that she had a smudge on her forehead. Apparently, the smudge was wholly intentional. She received ashes on her forehead every Ash Wednesday. Ash Wednesday, I learned, started the season of Lent leading up to Easter. I wondered why you would not use a more colorful pastel rather than black if Ash Wednesday had to do with Easter.

In the Church calendar, Ash Wednesday begins the season of Lent with a reminder: "Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return."(Now the black makes sense). I find it fitting priests call it the imposition of ashes. For, it is an imposition. The reminder of one's finitude & mortality feels like an imposition in my world. Why should I be reminded of death when it has not yet come for me? Because my heart is the threat today. My heart threatens to hurt those I love. It threatens to create division between the Lord & I. My heart loves, and it often loves badly. Ash Wednesday is an imposition to put your heart in a position of reflection & repentance.

As big as my grandmother's heart was, she needed Ash Wednesday. It was not just a smudge on the forehead, it was an imposition & invitation to repentance. This Lent, I will put down one good thing as a fast & pick up one good thing as a discipline. Today, I wear ashes of the cross on my forehead. Today, I pray this prayer as a sinner in need of grace:

Almighty and everlasting God, you hate nothing you have made and forgive the sins of all who are penitent: Create and make in us new and contrite hearts, that we, worthily lamenting our sins and acknowledging our wretchedness, may obtain of you, the God of all mercy, perfect remission and forgiveness; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen. -Book of Common Prayer-