...and to dust you will return.

These words are spoken by priests (RC/Anglican/Orthodox) as they daub the foreheads of the faithful with a blend of burned palm cross and oil, as part of the ritual of repentance that marks the start of Lent.  Other Christian traditions don't 'do' ashing, we find it a little odd, sometimes even a bit macabre.  Certainly it is sombre, reminding people of their mortality and smallness in the grand scheme of things.  I do wonder, though, whether there are less depressing and more uplifting ways of reading/hearing that without ending up being accused of heresy.

You are dust, and to dust you will return.  That's a fact.  Every molecule, every atom in my body was once part of something else, they are borrowed by me (or for me) and after me they will be dispersed to await incorporation to someone or something else.  When I first became conscious of that, many years ago, I found it rather scary, it did seem to stress yet further the nothingness and unimportance of 'me'.  But these days, having been confronted with my own mortality, I find it rather comforting and reassuring.  That my interconnectedness with the earth, and the continued worth of the chemicals that compose me, is very positive and worthwhile. Recognising my own inherent and indestructible place in creation has to affect the way I view it, and how I live within in it.

This is not the whole picture.  The unique 'I' is far more than a random collection of chemicals carefully configured.  I am not, as our ethics lecturer used to express it, 'a computer made of meat'.  The personality, the intellect, the soul, the spirit, these are - for me anyway - not merely the result of chemical reactions or electrical impulses, but something that both arises within and somehow transcends creation.  For me it is not enough simply that I am dust and will return to dust, I need more - I need the hope of 'sure and certain resurrection to eternal life' not as some kind of literal remaking of me as I am now (or was at 17 or 36 or might be if I live to 60) but as a continuation of the unique 'Catriona' who, whilst shaped by a physical creation, exists beyond it. 

'Earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust, in sure and certain hope of the resurrection to eternal life in Christ our Lord.'  These words I say at the end of every funeral carry with them both the reality of our earthiness and the hope of our eternity.

Remember that you are dust, and to dust you will return... child of earth, inextricably bound with all creation, loved into being by God.

One day I will hand back my borrowed chemical elements, in much the same way as a borrowed garment; on that day when they are no longer nedded to protect and contain me, a new kind of life will be mine.  Until then, I will cherish the life I have, and try to be more aware of my true place in creation.

Quoted directly from Christain Aid resource leaflets.

For adults:

Around 24% of children of primary school age in sub-Saharan Africa and 7% in Southern Asia do
not attend school.

Give 30p if there is a non-fee-paying primary school where you live

For children:

School might sometimes feel like a bit of a pain. But school is really important for us to learn the things we need for life. It’s great that in Britain and Ireland everybody can go to school without having to pay for it. In sub-Saharan Africa, almost one in four children do not go to school. Imagine what it would be like to have to go to work instead of school, or to stay at home to look after everyone in your family. Write down one new thing that you have learned at school today and say a prayer of thanks for your teacher.

My pledge

Day 1 - 30p

Total so far 30p

This year I am taking a break from producing daily reflections throughout Lent, and instead I am going to post the daily item from the Christian Aid 'Count Your Blessings' leaflets for adults and children.  I hope that doing this will encourage a few more people to think about this, and maybe to donate to Christian Aid as suggested.  Apart from that the usual miscellany of bloggage will continue in its usual 'ramblings, reflections and rubbish' (the original subtitle to this blog) manner.

Well I wasn't expecting to see this news reported!   Whatever I may think of his views or his papacy, it is a wise man who knows when to call it a day, and I respect Pope Benedict XVI for having the courage so to do.  I also think it is rather fitting that this elderly theologian can spend the last part of his life out of the spotlight pursuing those matters that energise him.  We pray for him, for his successor, and for the Roman Catholic Communion in this time of change.

On a less serious note:

Yesterday someone posted a question on Facebook asking Christians what made them lose joy and hope.  I thought it was an interesting question, pondered briefly and then replied that, based on how I understand them, I have never lost either.  Indeed, I would say that it is actually joy and hope, along with other 'Spiritual fruitiness' that is what remains, and sustains me, in the very dark places that other people were identifying as those which caused them to lose joy or hope.  Perhaps, as I hinted in my reply, it is what we mean by 'hope' and 'joy' that informs how it is affected by circumstance.

JOY

It's a pair of stories I have told many times before, here and elsewhere, about knowing what joy is, but they bear a further telling, because they illustrate so well what I mean.  Each arose from all age services looking at the 'fruit of the Spirit' one from a child of around five, the other from a woman in her sixties...

Little girl jumping up and down on the spot says "it's when you just can't stop yourself from jumping for joy"

Grandmother who had just buried her (third) infant grandchild in the same week as a young couple in the church had given birth to a healthy baby, "joy means I can be happy for A&B even though my heart is breaking for C&D"

This is joy, not some fluffy emotion, not fleeting happiness, but indefatigable, irrepressible, refusal to be overcome... the light shines in the darkness and the darkness has not overcome it.

HOPE

Again I think there is a need to explain what we mean by hope - and what we don't.  The word is used so glibly (and I am as guilty as any) that it applies to anything we wish for... I hope it doesn't rain, I hope to see you next week, I hope the film is good...  But that is as far from Christian hope as you can wish for.  Another story...

The little Baptist worship book called Patterns and Prayer includes a couple of suggested liturgies for infant blessings.  In one of the forms are words to the effect that this is done in the hope that the child will, in due course, come to faith and express that in baptism.  Evidently the publishing house queried the word 'hope' seeing it as too wishy-washy, too passive, too lacking in something or other they felt should be there.  The writers stood their ground; hope carries with it a sense of expectation, an acceptance of activity, a certain something that, whatever happens the promise will come good.

Whenever I try to define hope, I end up at Hebrews 11 and the great catalogue of 'faithful' people.  Hope is, I feel, very like and very allied to, faith.  Even though I walk through a valley as dark as death, yet I have hope.

I have a good life, a mostly happy and fulfilling life, but by heck it has had - and will continue to have - some dark places, frightening places, anxious places, lonely places.  There are times when I am anything but happy, times when all my dream lie in tatters at my feet, but I do believe that joy and hope survive - and it is the fact that they do, they they are not defined or constrained by circumstance, that means whatever ever happens I can cling on, if only by my finger tips, and keep on keeping on.

Sometimes things seem to happen all at once.  A lot of my friends and my church folk are facing enormous challenges and frightening times.  For the most part they remain resilient and strong - well on the outside anyway, even though they ache and break inwards.  I pray, with all the faith I can muster, that joy and hope, peace and love will be theirs.

As the final verse of the old hymn "I thank three Lord of rlife" puts it:

I thank thee, Lord, for hope:
What yet shall be I may not know;
the unseen days will changes bring,
but through them all hope's star shall glow,
and I shall have my song to sing.

James W Butcher (1857-1937)