In which I talk to myself as others listen in on Ash Wednesday.
Our ashes each year are made from burning palm crosses from the previous year.
Ash is all that remains after a fire, the caustic, dry remains of what was once living.
A reminder of destruction and death.
It’s a grim thing to do really, to paint ashes onto our bodies and remind ourselves of our own mortality.
You may have watched, as I have, some of the David Attenborough programmes on the life of plants -the green planet.
In one episode he visits the Finbos region of south Africa and walks through the scorched earth of the forest after a devastating fire. All that can be seen are burnt, brittle skeletons of trees that were once green, and the thick dark dust that covers the once fertile earth, as the smouldering embers still smoke and the stench of death is choking. It looks like an apocalyptic scene, the end of life in that place. But just 4 days after the flames, rising from the ashes, a fire lily appears, delicate, red against the grey ash, it has been lying dormant for 15 years. Gradually but quite remarkably it pokes its first shoot through the ash and opens out into a vibrant red flower that stands out in the middle of the monochrome grey landscape.
The fire lily needs the fire and the ash for it to burst into life. Without the seeming devastation of the fire, it cannot bloom. The fire and the ash that seem to signal nothing but death and destruction in fact bring life, beautiful life, for the fire lily.
And that is perhaps why for nearly 2000 years Christians have returned to the imagery of ash on this day. It is a reminder, of course, of our own mortality. From dust we came, and to dust we shall return.
But it is the gift of this ash, this evening, to bring life in its wake. The eerie quiet of a post -fire forest is mirrored in our quiet pause in life as we stop in our tracks and ponder.
And that stopping, that reflecting, that reassessing – that dwelling for the moment in the ash of today – brings with it the promise of a small, delicate, beautiful life that is birthed through the season of Lent.
Like the fire lily, our spiritual lives need the dramatic pause of ash and all that represents to bring us life in its fullness, its richness, its beauty, its creativity. It is in the middle of life when all hope seems lost that God brings life. It is through our own reminder of our frailty and brokenness that we are able to come to God for healing, and for new life. It is out of the ashes of hopes dashed and disappointments encountered that God is able to offer new beginnings and something different, but beautiful.
And whilst it is God alone who can bring that new life and new hope, we do have a responsibility in this too. We have the task of confronting what looks like ash, caustic and lifeless, in our spiritual life in order to allow God the opportunity to work. We can do that any time, of course we can. But we (or I?) often forget, or get used to the grey ash of my spiritual life. And so the annual opportunity that Lent offers is a welcome one; a chance to reassess where I have been, where I might have been, and to acknowledge my frailty before God. And sometimes that takes a while. 40 days seems a good length. Long enough to take a proper look at the ashes and wait for new life, in whatever form, to appear.
Ashing alone would be a depressing memento mori – reminder of death – if it were not for the reminder too of the little fragile yet resilient fire lily – the promise of life that not only come out of the ashes, but relies on them entirely for its existence.
As we are ashed tonight, let that ashing be for us the beginning of new life, a passage into something new, an opportunity to rise again at Easter into resurrection with Christ and the depths of love and beauty that promises.
Musings of a Maverick Priest 