My oldest was not even two years old the first time I took him to an Ash Wednesday service and went up with him for the imposition of ashes. His big blue eyes were wide with curiosity as my husband, who was the parish priest, made the sign of the cross in oily ashes on his still baby-soft forehead.
“Remember you are dust and to dust you will return.”
My heart clenched in a way it never had before. Ash Wednesday is one of those quirky liturgical things that marks you out as you walk around with dirt on your face all day, and you watch people do a double take and debate whether or not to say anything.
Sure, I’m dust. No big deal.
But to think that my baby is dust. Whew. That’s a whole other thing.
People in my social media feeds have been getting a kick out of Ash Wednesday and Valentine’s Day falling on the same day this year.
It’s as if the idea that thinking about love and death in the same breath is something we can't look directly at, and so we have to find ways to laugh at it.
I love you, remember you are dust. You love me, remember I am dying. Not imminently, but you know, as part of being human in this world where we move through life, move through time one way.
We get just the one “wild and precious life” (Mary Oliver), and that is the condition that makes life precious. That means we don’t squander it. That means we take the risk, we say I love you, we risk getting our heart broken over and over again by these other fragile companions on this journey.
To look at someone and dare to love them when they’re dying. When we’re dying. It’s a big risk.
But without the risks, are we really even living?
Ash Wednesday asks us to look our own mortality in the face and then walk around with signs of it on our face as a tiny sign act, reminding the world, perhaps when they least want to be reminded of it: remember you are dying.
It asks us to look our loved ones in the face and have the courage to continue loving them even as they are also dying.
It asks us to look across the globe and see the death and destruction in other countries, and realize that every one of those numbers is a person just as loved and just as precious as our own loved ones and that whole worlds are being extinguished with each life lost. There’s a Jewish proverb that says if you save a life you save the world, and the inverse is true as well.
Remember you are dust. Remember all of these fragile bundles of flesh and dust we love are just like those being bombed and starved and hurt and killed. Remember that our freedom is collective, that none of us are free until all of us are free.
What will you do with your one wild and precious life?
“Remember you are dust” asks us to close the gap that lets us push tragedies in Gaza and in Darfur away and keep them at arm's length and instead asks us, what can we do about it? It’s such a big problem and it’s easy to feel helpless, but one thing you can do this Lent is join a Gaza Ceasefire Pilgrimage and try to get the attention of our government that is still helping to fund the ongoing plausible genocide happening right now in Gaza. As far as I know, our government isn’t funding the perpetrators in Darfur, so we focus on what we can do something about.
For more information on joining or creating a pilgrimage in your city visit:
https://www.gazaceasefirepilgrimage.com/
I’m working with some folks in Nashville to put together a walk here, so if you are in Nashville, reply to this email so I can add you to the list as we get organized.
International Court of Justice finds charge of genocide against Israel “plausible”
Flare-up of conflict and genocidal actions in Darfur.
Want to hear this piece read by the author? Become a paid subscriber and get access to the full archives, the Poisoned Bible Project, and audio editions of most new essays. Can’t afford a paid subscription, but still want access to all of the above? Simply reply to this email and ask, and you’ll be added to the list.
“I wish I could still believe in God, but I can’t be a Christian anymore because of ______” Fill-in-the-blank with racism, misogyny, homophobia, toxic capitalism, and so on. I’ve had this conversation with different people almost word-for-word over and over. White American Christianity has so defined God that many people cannot separate God from the toxic theology they were taught.
But this isn’t the God I see in the Bible. The Bible shows us a God meeting people where they are and nudging them towards justice and total thriving for all: shalom. The Bible details arcs of justice and societal reform. If we understand how radical those arcs were in the context of the day, we can extend them forward into the future and figure out how to work for justice, total thriving, and societal reformation in our day.
I grew up in that first world view. Come along, and I’ll tell you the story of how I escaped, and I’ll show you a theology that I believe paints a more accurate picture: a faith for the common good where everyone thrives and no one is left out.
Purchase
Wipf and Stock | Order through your favorite Indie bookstore | Amazon
Connect
Anna Elisabeth Howard writes highly caffeinated takes on shalom as a lens for everything from her front porch in Hendersonville, TN where she lives with her husband and two sons. She is a community organizer and movement chaplain with a background in youth and family ministry and is a graduate of Fuller Theological Seminary. An avid hiker and backpacker, many thoughts start somewhere in the middle of the woods, or under a waterfall. She is a regular contributer to Earth & Altar and her latest book is Inward Apocalypse: Uncovering a Faith for the Common Good.
Buy Inward Apocalypse: Amazon | Independent Booksellers
Social media: Facebook | Instagram
Join the subscriber chat! If you already have the app, just go to the new chat section, if not, download the app here.
I’m one of the facilitators of Freedom Road’s Global Writers’ Group. If you’ve been looking for a community of writers to boost you to the next step of your writing goals—wherever you are in that process—join us!