Good Shepherd,
Berkeley 3/5/14
Joel 2:1-2, 12-17 Psalm 51• 2
Corinthians 5:20-6:10 • Matthew
6:1-6, 16-21
1 Blow the trumpet in Zion; sound the
alarm on my holy mountain! Let all the inhabitants of the land tremble, for the
day of the LORD is coming, it is near-
A time of darkness, a time of gloom
and clouds, a time of mystery is foretold. A time of moving into a
wilderness of darkness. In Lent we all begin to wander through our personal
wilderness, our own trail of ashes. It may well seem dark. And it all begins
now, on Ash Wednesday.
On this very
day, we are asked to consider the starkest, and the darkest of realities:
remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return.
Today I took a
dried bunch of palms from last Palm Sunday, and, as tradition dictates, I
burned them and pounded them into powder. I watched the flame rise and saw with
satisfaction how completely the dried leaves were consumed with flame, how
quickly and efficiently the ashes were produced. As I looked at them I thought
of the human ashes I have seen, and how true it is- we do all return to the
dust.
As a clergy
person I probably have had more experiences with ashes than most. I have noted
that the ashes from a really large person were, to my surprise, heavier than
those of a normal sized person. I have seen a mother cry as she held the box of
her daughter’s ashes saying, “She was so much bigger than this!” Over and over
again, I have seen people who prefer to keep the ashes of their loved one on
their mantel or on their bedside table, unable to part with them for a more
conventional resting place.
I have been
schooled in the handing of ashes- human and palm-sourced. I was taught that you
open the container of Ash Wednesday ashes slowly, so as to avoid a cloud of ash
erupting in your face, creating unintended comic effect.
I was taught
that when you are going to bury human ashes, never to just pour them out from
the mortuary container as, once again, you will raise a dust cloud with, this
time, an unintended horrific effect.
I had my mother’s
ashes for a long time, as no one knew what to do with them, so I had the chance
to take a peek. To my surprise, I got the soothing impression of tiny seashells
and course sand on a white beach. Very peaceful.
I never saw my
father’s ashes, but I had to preach about them, as it was the only way to honor
his scientific cynicism and still preach resurrection. I said that although my
father did not believe in God, he would have passionately believed that the carbonates and calcium phosphates and
the trace elements of iron, magnesium and copper in his ashes would eventually
bond with the organic elements of the soil he loved so well (he was a soil
scientist) and in the fullness of time, new life would emerge. And so it is with
all of us.
It is science again, and not romance,
that teaches us that we are indeed such stuff as stars are made of. The
composition of most stars after all, is mostly hydrogen and helium, about the
same as the composition of our bodies. We are such stuff as not only dreams,
but stars are made of. And we will always be, whatever we believe our spirits
will do after death.
The ashes with which you are about to
be blessed are composed of the palms we carried in procession last Palm Sunday,
and the ashes of the old bulletins that were incinerated in our church fire a
little over a year ago. Both the palm ashes and the paper ash contain calcium
carbonates, and trace elements of metals, just as human ashes do.
We are anointed today with our
mortality, blessed with the reminder that this life is precious, fleeting, and
most of all temporary. With the knowledge of this deep in our hearts, we are
poised for our Lenten journey. With whatever precious time we have left, what
are we to do? How can we better discern God’s will for us? How can we decipher
the mysterious, powerful and transformative teachings of Jesus? And what trace,
what palimpsest of love, or lack thereof, will remain, after our spirit has
left us?
Amen
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