ASH

The title of my homily is, “Ash” -  A S H - as in Ash Wednesday.

It’s Ash Wednesday and every year when I come to doing a new sermon - I like to see where I am this year - so last night I looked at the words,  “Ash Wednesday” - and wondered where to go for this Ash Wednesday - 2019.

It was then that the short 3 letter first  word,  “ash” - A S H hit me.

I said to myself, “For a reflection on Ash Wednesday, simply  go with some ponderings of the  word  ‘ash’.

I’m not a scientist, but I began to wonder about how much ash can be found in a breath of air - if any?  Annapolis has to be better than Dakar, Senegal - featured in today’s New York Times - as having plenty of pollution.

Are there ashes floating in the air around us?

We’ve all seen a scene from a movie where someone crumbles or tosses a letter into a fire  -  in a fireplace.

It could be a “Dear John….” letter or a rejection letter and we see on film the  paper burning  and dancing and disappearing in the flames.

Do tiny - tiny - tiny - much, much, much,  smaller than a piece of dandruff - pieces  of ash float into the room - into one’s lungs - or land on door tops.

Rejection letters, or angry letters - remain in one’s memories for years - when one is burnt - long after those letters are burnt.

Ash remains in the fireplace - in the campfire - in the backyards of our lives.

Carl Sandburg in his poem,  “Cornhuskers” [1918] wrote, “I tell you the past is a bucket of ashes.”

Are we surrounded - are we standing in - the ashes, in the dust, in the backyard, in the graveyard, of all those who have gone before us?

Memories - tiny gestures of love or neglect - or regret - of those who have gone before us - continue to exist - even though our loved ones are closed and coffined and casketed - as ashes in fine boxes - buried in our cemeteries - buried in our memories - but sometimes they flame up - or float around us.  They return. They remain.

We humans have this wonderful gift called, “Memories.”

We human beings have this powerful word and commandment, “Remember.”

We humans do a lot of things in memory of others and from others.

So on Ash Wednesday we ponder these heavy thoughts - that are sitting there like dust - on the furniture of our being.

We hear the heavy words, “Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return.”

We hear the words, “Repent, and believe in the gospel.”

We ponder that Ash Wednesday is Day One of Lent - that we are living in borrowed time - that time is lent to us to live - with love - and care - and to serve others. The ones who give - who live for others - and not for themselves - are the ones we are happy that they continue to live in our memories - even when they  have turned to ashes - to dust.

We ponder that the Son of God entered into our story - into our history - into our time - and dies like all of us at the end of Lent - on Good Friday - Good because three days later God - Christ - the Son of the Father rises in the flesh. There is no dust of Christ - no relics of Christ - in our dust - in our air - only the Spirit of God - floating in and out of our being when enter into his Spirit.

But there is bread…. There is wine… So we eat Christ - we drink Christ - we take the life of Christ into our ears and into our mouths. We enter into Communion with him - and that’s what lasts - that’s what makes this life - so beautiful - as well as the knowing that at the end of all this is not ashes - not dust - but eternal resurrection.  

So we pray: “Thy Kingdom Come - on earth as it is in heaven."