Ash Wednesday
- February 17, 2021
St. Mary’s in
Salem
Joel 2:12-18
2 Cor 5:20-6:2
Matt 6:1-6, 16-18
Praised be
Jesus Christ!
One of the neatest things about Ash
Wednesday, which is how we begin our observance of Lent each year, is that Ash Wednesday
is for everybody. Just like in Israel of old, when the prophet Joel announced
his message in God’s Name, all are invited to accept ashes on the forehead. Ash
Wednesday is a call to repentance from sin and it is for everyone from least to
greatest.
“with fasting, weeping and mourning”
… “return to me with your whole heart” says the prophet on God’s behalf.
Among
God’s People both Old and New Testament there is no one who can stand blameless
before the Lord, we all need to change our hearts. We all need to turn back to God;
we all need to beseech Him to spare us and not punish us as we deserve for
having played strange with Him. All of us old and young, adults, adolescents,
children, even babies, to the extent that we can make choices, we all need to
be forgiven by God for not having put the Lord at the center of our lives.
“Gather the people, notify the
congregation; Assemble the elders, gather the children and the infants at the breast.”
For what purpose? To beg pardon of God, all of us and without exception.
We do it by letting the priest smudge
our foreheads with blessed ashes saying, “Remember that you are dust and to
dust you shall return!”
It is not theater; it is not play
acting. It is a prayer, a meditation on just how fragile, how tenuous human
life is. In Matthew’s Gospel, Jesus says – do not do penance for show! No, that
is not the sense of Ash Wednesday. What we are doing is bringing home a
fundamental truth using a powerful sacramental, namely blessed ashes. It should
inspire us to do real penance in the next 40 days leading up to the great feast
of Easter.
May the Lord hear our prayer today and help
us, all of us, to return to Him with our whole heart!
Praised be
Jesus Christ!
PROPERANTES ADVENTUM DIEI DEI
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