Thealogical Lady: A Blog

Living Lent: Ash Wednesday

2/23/2012

Tonight we are marked with ash, the symbol of our coming from and returning to dust. Repent, and believe in the gospel. My pastor in Oakland used those words as he marked my 16-month-old daughter's forehead, then said to me, "Isn't it funny to say this to someone like her?"

I smiled. Yeah, it's pretty hilarious to make a command to anyone under two, as if there's the remotest chance that they might listen. I mean, really?

But on the other hand, no--it's quite serious, and rather radical. She's a catechumen, after all--she has been since she was two months old. And that makes her a part of this journeying community. She belongs. And repenting is both her right and her vocation for as long as she lives and breathes.

You know how sometimes a phrase will stick with you when you hear it at just the right moment? Tonight, at the start of the Ash Wednesday liturgy, the pastoral associate spoke of the tender mercy of God. Tender. Yes. Yes, that's right. God is tender when we turn toward Her, empty-handed. God grasps our hands tenderly, firmly, asking to behold us. God is lover, friend, ally, and truth-teller. God is healer. God is...

Well, God is good. All the time.

And we always get to turn back, because God always wants us back.

God always wants us back.

I dunno about you, but that really sums up the whole Christian gig for me.

And I suppose that's why Lent's my favorite liturgical season.

Keep an eye out for more Lenten blog posts--I hope to make these a daily occurrence.

9 Comments

Noach Dzmura link

2/22/2012 05:10:27 pm

Some thoughts.
A nice and inspiring post to usher in the Lenten season of return and repentence.

In my theology, God is everything. Good, middle of the road and bad, peacetime, police action or warfare, famine, getting by, and plenty. Lover, liker and hater. Making God 'just good' is idolatry.

'God wants us back' says we can go away from God, and that's not possible. We're enmeshed in the world, its air, its soil, our flesh and blood. Even turning away is turning toward the Divine.

'God wants us back' also says God cares. And that's not always the case in my world. Sometimes God doesn't care, or doesn't hear. Thta's not God (Creation) being bad; that's God (Creation) being God (Creation).

Personifying the Divine is necessary at times, to feel the nurturing touch of a parent. But when we make God benevolent and human we lose site of Its awesomeness and sheer unlimited terrifying power.

Feel free to disreagard any and all of this. Or we can pick up any piece of it and talk it out on our next creative day.

Lubz

Kate Allen link

2/23/2012 12:59:50 am

"God is everything." I believe there's truth in that, but it's not theologically satisfying to me. Because if God is everything, then everything is God. And I don't believe rape is God. I don't believe war is God. I don't believe hegemony and the abuse and murder it leads to is God. I believe all those things are other-than-God, apart-from-God. I believe that I have the ability to turn from God as well as the ability to turn back, and I believe that even in God's presence I can feel infinitely alone. My theology's based in the psalms.

I also think there's divine room enough for both our theologies, and that's a beautiful, hopeful thing. :)

What I love about Lent is that it ritualizes the moments when I/we feel most distant from the divine, and also when we feel the greatest need for a change of heart. Trans(!)formation is a fundamental part of my Christian identity, and Lent and Advent and Easter are those times when transformation are highlighted most shockingly, breathtakingly, radically.

Noach Dzmura

2/23/2012 04:04:52 am

I agree that there is room enough for all the theologies in the world.
Thanks for giving me a chance to articulate some of my own. The Days of Awe culminating in Yom Kippur also make time for tshuvah, a return to the Divine.

For me, though, returning is not about changing my direction. It's about realizing anew how completely alles ist Gott. All is God. God is in everything, nothing exists apart from God; nothing is outside of God. Every experience is a face of the Divine. For me, to have the Divine only located in pleasant warm experiences is not theologically satisfying. The God of my experience --personal experience in this Creation- exists in horrible events as well as pleasant ones.

Bec link

2/23/2012 12:23:46 am

I have always liked this idea and still hold onto it, despite my atheism/agnosticism. Because even though I don't necessarily have the belief in the divine or in repentence or redemption in that sense, I love the idea of coming from dust and returning to dust. I find that wholly and immensely satisfying. That I am of this earth, and that I will become part of it again. What a wonderful end. As if we are there, stored in some kind of memory-that-is-not-memory, within the earth.

I'll enjoy your posts about Lent, I think. I like the idea of it being a contemplative time.

2/23/2012 01:01:09 am

That's beautiful, Bec. Thank you. I hope you do read along and comment as you're inspired. :)

mothering spirit link

2/23/2012 03:28:28 am

Beautifully mused, Kate. I, too, was struck with the strange beauty of reminding parents that their children will return to ashes, just like them. Something about becoming a parent makes me want to cling to immortality - if not for me (and the desire to stick around till these boys are long-grown runs so deep) then for them (the desire to deny the real fact of their some-day deaths runs even deeper). Maybe giving their sweet foreheads over to a stranger who rubs ashes in a cross helps me take a first step in remembering that I don't need to worry about handing them over to God's hands. Because they were God's all along.

Happy Lenten blogging!

2/23/2012 03:15:46 pm

L, thank you so much. <3 I hadn't thought of the ash on AEMA's forehead in quite in that way, but you are so right. The reminder and inevitability of death in that smudge wrenches the heart, especially a mama's heart. Sometimes I look at AEMA and spontaneously weep, thinking of how she would be impacted forever if she were ever to lose one of her parents, or if we were to lose her. It's a matter of time, Lent says. Let go, Lent says, in so many ways.

Thank you so much for drawing attention to that, L. <3

Paul Web

2/23/2012 11:35:17 am

Deus Caritas est. God has no beginning, no end; infinite in power and in love. God is all good, yet we find Him in our daily crosses. Evil results from our 'turning away' from God, thus our need for repentance (turning back). I love the blog and all the responses...very thoughtful. Love y'all.

2/23/2012 03:17:50 pm

Yes, God is love, and those who dwell in God abide in love. I think you're spot on when you say we find God in our daily crosses. Or, as is more often the case for me, God finds us. <3

Thanks for reading, Daddy-o!

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Living Lent: Ash Wednesday

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Rev. M. Kate Allen

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