CSI Jaffna Diocese

MEDITATION FOR ASH WEDNESDAY

Scripture Readings: Joel 2:12-17; Ps. 51; 2 Cor. 5:20-6:2; Mt. 6:1-6, 16-18.

Rend your hearts...and Return (Joel 2:12)

Dear Sisters & Brothers in Christ,

Today, Christians around the world will mark the beginning of Lent by observing Ash Wednesday. In these forty days leading up to Easter, believers devote special attention to the disciplines of repentance, self-examination, and self-denial. The ashes which many traditions daub on the forehead symbolize our inner penitence, and also remind us of our mortality as we read in the words that God spoke to Adam in Genesis 3:19, words which are often read during Lent: “you are dust, and to dust you shall return” (NRSV).

Ash Wednesday inaugurates not simply the 40 days preceding Easter but the whole 90-day paschal cycle, which extends beyond Easter seven weeks until Pentecost. The Lectionary cycle grew backward and forward from the central celebration of Easter. Hence we are reminded of the one mystery—the death of Jesus, his resurrection and the gift of the Spirit.

The theme for Ash Wednesday is sounded by the call to public repentance in Joel, “return to me with your whole heart; rend your heart not your garments.” The Gospel according to Matthew speaks of prayer and almsgiving, which, together with fasting, make up the traditional triad of Lenten observances. Fasting and almsgiving touch on two fundamental drives of human life for nourishment and ownership. Therefore, sacrificing them involves an act of trust in God that is sustained only by prayer.

What the Roman Catholic theologian Karl Rahner said is of pertinence: "When on Ash Wednesday we hear the words, ‘Remember, you are dust,’ we are also told that we are brothers and sisters of the incarnate Lord. In these words we are told everything that we are: nothingness that is filled with eternity; death that teems with life; futility that redeems; dust that is God’s life forever."

Psalm 51 is usually read on Ash Wednesday. The Psalmist begins with, “Have mercy on me, O God, according to your steadfast love; according to your abundant mercy blot out my transgressions.” Then he goes on to say, "Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me… The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit: a broken and contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not despise." The use of both "create" and "make" is to show in an emphatic and forcible way that there is in us nothing that God can use for his work of cleansing. God has to send God’s Spirit to create out of nothing the clean, new and contrite heart. It is emphatically told that ‘regeneration’ and ‘sanctification’ are gifts of God.

The recitation of Psalm 51 -- "Wash me through and through from my wickedness" -- and a litany of penitence -- "We confess to you, Lord, all our past unfaithfulness..." -- and kneeling while ashes are rubbed into our foreheads strike a deep chord in weary hearts. We should remember that there are times when we are painfully aware of our shortcomings and there are times when we need to be confronted with our mortality. We should understand that Ash Wednesday presents us with an annual opportunity to satisfy this part of our spiritual identity, and we can grovel to our heart's content.

Ash Wednesday is also a time of celebration of interconnectedness. "Remember that you are dust and to dust you shall return," is said to each and every one of us. In this connection one may try to understand the sign of the cross

We all know that it is at Baptism we receive the sign of the cross on their foreheads, and are "marked as Christ's own for ever." We are ‘signed with a corporate identity as children of God,’ brothers and sisters of Christ, citizens of the household of faith and the kingdom of God.

Then on Ash Wednesday, as we are marked with the sign of the cross, the sign is clearly visible. It is important to focus our minds to this sign.

The mark of the cross is the shape of a capital "I" scratched out. This capital "I" is uniquely me. My strengths and my weaknesses. My talents and my sins. But this capital "I" is also that which separates me from God.

In imposing the ashes, the vertical stroke of the capital "I" is followed by the horizontal stroke of crossing it out. The "I" that is crossed out is the "I" that leads to the feelings of alienation from God. It is the ‘sin’ (cf. v.2), the alienation and fellings of being separated from God, the sense that God is totally transcendent and holy and I am simply mortal and fallen. It is as if in the horizontal stroke the loving arms of Christ are stretched out to welcome me back home. The wiping away of the "I" that separates me from God gives me the freedom and the ability to reach out to my brothers and sisters.

Friends, the ‘cross of ashes’ is a call to repent of the "sin" that I allow to separate me from God -- a call to forgiveness and wholeness -- and at the same time, the cross of ashes is formed by my personal relationship with God intersecting with my solidarity, my commonality, with all the others for whom Christ died

Ash Wednesday:

Ø Is a time when we as Christians are reminded that our spirituality is not simply an individual way to feel good in our private relationship with God, but a call to confront evil in whatever form it appears, within ourselves, in our communities, in our culture, and in our world

Ø It is a call to return to God, through practices of prayer, fasting, and almsgiving.

Ø It is a call to look upon the human condition, and see it as God sees it.

The message of Ash Wednesday is that there is no shortcut to Easter, but it points toward Easter.

Ø Ash Wednesday is the beginning of a journey that leads through Holy Week and Good Friday, and then to Easter. And then necessarily to the Day of Pentecost as I said in the beginning.

Ø The message is not that God snatches us out of suffering, or provides a way to avoid having to face our mortality but that God became one of us in Jesus, and walks through it with us, to open the way of resurrection, not apart from the dust and ashes, not apart from the way of the cross, but through the dust and ashes, through the utter desolation of the cross to the resurrection.

Ø Jesus walks this human journey with us, to its uttermost, most desolate and empty end, trusting only in the One who alone can bring life out of these ashes.

The ashes are a sign, not only of our mortality, but also of our repentance, our return to God. Let us move backward from our stance and forward to God from our ‘alienation’ into ‘close association’ with our Saviour who is waiting to receive us with ‘His stretched arms,’ ‘the pierced arms,’ through which only comes our salvation.

So our call this Ash Wednesday (2008) is to follow Jesus into the wasteland, into the darkness, to face the entire human predicament head on, and to return to God, who restores us to life in Christ. Jesus himself has walked this way. We begin this Lent with our response to the call to follow in his footsteps.

Prayer:Almighty and everlasting God, who hatest nothing that thou hast made, and dost forgive the sins of all them that are penitent: Create and make in us new and contrite hearts, that we worthily lamenting our sins, and acknowledging our wretchedness, may obtain of thee, the God of all mercy, perfect remission and forgiveness; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.