Ashes

The word of the Lord came to Jonah a second time: "Set out for the great city of Nineveh, and announce to it the message that I tell you."  So Jonah made ready and went to Nineveh, according to the Lord's bidding.  Now Nineveh was an enormously large city; it took three days to go through it.  Jonah began his journey through the city, and had gone but a single day's walk announcing, "Forty days more and Nineveh shall be destroyed," when the people of Nineveh believed God; they proclaimed a fast and all of them, great and small, put on sackcloth. 

When the news reached the king of Nineveh, he rose from his throne, laid aside his robe, covered himself with sackcloth, and sat in the ashes.

When God saw by their actions how they turned from their evil way, he repented of the evil that he had threatened to do to them; he did not carry it out.   Jonah 3: 1-6, 10

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

Ash Wednesday, which marks the beginning of the season of Lent, falls on February 13th this year.  Pope Gregory the Great made Ash Wednesday part of the celebration of Lent around the year AD 600, when he fixed the date as 46 days before Easter. 

There are 6 Sundays between Ash Wednesday and Easter; and since Sunday, the day of our Lord's resurrection, is always a feast day, Sundays are not counted as part of Lent.  Therefore, that leaves 40 days for the observance of Lent.

Before Jesus began his public ministry (which would ultimately lead to his passion, death and resurrection), he spent 40 days in the desert fasting and praying.  It was during those 40 days that Jesus was tempted by Satan.  (see Matthew 4:1-11; Mark 1:12-13; Luke 4:1-13)

 

The ashes placed on our foreheads on Ash Wednesday (which are made from the palms from the previous year's Palm Sunday) represent our repentence, fragility, mortality, and need for God's redemption.  As the priest or deacon applies the ashes he says, "Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return." (from Genesis 3:19)

During the 40 days of Lent, Christians are asked to prepare themselves spiritually for Easter through prayer, repentence, almsgiving and self-denial.

"Every Christian renunciation, of whatever kind it may be, means saying 'Yes' to something bigger and more authentic," wrote Adrienne von Speyr.  That 'something bigger' is our death to self, resurrection and eternal life in Jesus Christ.

Stratford Caldecot, editor of Magnificat, writes this month, "Ash Wednesday can be a turning point for us, a moment of true metanoia.  The Greek word used for repentence literally means "change of mind" or "going beyond the mind" - as God calls us out of our sins, out of our old habits and worries, into a new existence, a stronger love for others, and a fresh dawn for the whole world."