Moths and Ashes

So today is Ash Wednesday.

For the uninitiated this is the first day of Lent. It's an amusing scene in our house the few days before Lent starts. We often opt to give things up in Lent, which is an increasingly popular aspect of the season, even for non-Christians. As usual, we've decided to quit chocolate. To compensate we've not stopped eating it for the last week; Cadbury Creme Eggs mostly...but anything we can get our hands on. I've become especially partial to Malteser Bunnies. Not for another 40 days though...

Despite this, I have been growing increasingly worried that a chocolate fast rather misses the point. Why, after all, do we give anything up? And what good will it do?

One of the perks of my job is a degree of flexibility about working hours. As a result, I have visited Ilkley this morning, firstly for a coffee with a friend, but secondly to attend St Margaret's Communion Service with the imposition of ashes. This is a sombre service during which all present have a cross marked on their foreheads with ashes. The ashes are made by burning up the palm crosses from last year's Easter season.

The sermon was given by my friend, Chris Phillips. He too asked that we should all question our motives during Lent. And this was challenging, not least because his words uncovered some dangerous thinking I'd succumbed to about ashing.

You see, I'd always imagined that (a little like Good Friday walks of witness) by getting ash on my forehead it would be a natural conversation starter beyond the walls of the church. People might laugh or mistakenly advise me to wash better, but I would then be able to speak of my faith.

On the contrary, one Bible reading during the service stated clearly:

"Beware of practicing your piety before others in order to be seen by them" (Matthew 6:1)

It was pointed out that wandering around with ashes on my head, might, in fact, be a sign of religious pride. I might genuinely end up speaking of God, but how might my ego, my pride me stroked and inflated.

Ashes serve two purposes: they are a sign of penance, and a symbol of our mortality. Talk of signs and symbols is, of course, to speak of sacraments. But imposition of ashes is not a sacrament, but it is (as Chris pointed out) 'sacramental'. I may be doing something with commonplace objects (ashes) but the act speaks of a deeper reality, and by taking part I am reminded. As the ashes were imposed on my forehead, these words were spoken to me:

"Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return.

Turn away from sin and be faithful to Christ"

By submitting to this rite, we are reminded that we have sinned, that we have not been faithful to Christ. Admittedly we do this every time we say the words of the confession, so why is this any different? It is because we simultaneously reminded that we will die.

It is incredibly unfashionable to speak of death.

But Lent is a season that is about death: the death of Jesus, but also our own death.

And this was made all the more poignant during the service when one of the congregation, a beautiful old lady called Joyce, who was too infirm to walk and kneel at the altar rail, was administered to where she sat. Seeing a (relatively) youthful priest gently, but firmly impose the ashes on this elderly lady, while saying those words, nearly brought me to tears. How must it have felt, for Joyce, who is plainly closer to death than most, be reminded of her mortality, but also her sinfulness?!

How does it make you feel to be reminded that you are sinful and you will die?

Meanwhile, during the sermon, I noticed a butterfly, or perhaps it was a moth, fluttering about, over the gathered assembly. Amusingly, the Matthew reading had just referred to moths:
"Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust consume...but store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth nor rust consumes...For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also" (Matt 6:19-21)

As I studied the delicate butterfly/moth I smiled.

They are so fragile, but beautiful. They are so transitory too - their lives are brief.

And how much like them am I?

Our morning prayers contained these words from 1 Timothy: "We brought nothing into the world, so that we can take nothing out of it" (1 Tim 6:6)

Our lives are so brief, so transitory.

But they can be things of beauty. The prayer of confession has us repent for 'marring your image in us'. When we sin, we somehow damage the person God designed and longs for us to be. We do this in so many small ways, without noticing. We fail to love God as we should and so our very image is damaged. We are caught up in the business of storing up treasure that will be eaten by moths!

And so much of our straining, labouring, toiling is about a false image we want to maintain, to try and keep people in the dark about who we really are.

Which rather brings me back to ashes.

I wanted people to see me with my little mucky cross on my head, not in order to evangelise, but in order to persuade people that I am better than I really am. I want to give up chocolate so that people will think I'm a better person than I am. It's all about posturing and pretending.

The reality of ashes was lost to me: I am grateful to have been reminded of my true nature.