The Lenten ashes applied to our foreheads vividly symbolize the essential mystery of our faith: in and through death comes new life. Before the days of recycling, it was an old Italian custom at the end of each winter, to do a thorough spring cleaning, then to gather the junk into a pile at the center of the village and burn it. When we collect the ashes from the previous year’s palms we do something similar: we get rid of the junk that clutters our lives and prevents us from experiencing life more fully. Yes, we wear the ashes as a sign of our human mortality, as a mark of our sorrow, and as a sign of our intention to turn like the heliotrope toward the light of Christ.

But it is important that we not overlook the obvious: the ashes are not merely smudged on our foreheads but traced “indelibly” on us in the form of a cross. For Christians, the cross which was historically the place of execution becomes through faith the sign of new and eternal life.

Christ has died; Christ is risen; Christ will come again.

So on Holy Thursday we sing of the glory of the cross. Jesus’ enactment of love poured out entirely on the cross is the earthly culmination of the Divine self-giving that is the essence of the incarnation. We should glory in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, for he is our salvation, our life and our resurrection; through him we are saved and made free (Gal. 6:14). Ashes in the form of a cross announce loud and clear: God’s grace defeats human sin. LIFE, not death, is the final word.

~ Wishing you a blessed Lent. ■