Ash Wednesday - Return to God

Today we are asked to return to God with all our hearts. As Fr. Myles has called it before - a return to The Genuine in you.

I can sit in a narrative of; I'm doing pretty well here. I'm quite comfy; living in a lay-Jesuit house, surrounded by incredible guys and praying daily. Return to God? I'm not the target audience here, sure I'm resting here already.

I know that I slip into that posture, and it's actually probably less a case of me being numb to my sin. But rather a complete miscalculation of how incredible I am called to be. So today I'm trying to acknowledge that there is something broken within me, in my heart, and at the same time that I'm called to be more.

In the bible, those covered in ashes generally were at some turning point in their lives. Something forced them to fundamentally alter their way of life, it was a case of - If I keep living like this, I'm headed for ruin.

It's an acknowledgment of this turning point, a complete one-eighty, but actually it's deeper still. Metanoia, that Greek word for repentance. Its full meaning is “change of mind or purpose”. You hear it as ashes are placed on your forehead; Repent (Metanoeite). And believe in the Gospel.

So the ashes themselves represent that out-of-kilterness, the fact that I am not how I should be, I haven't always made the best choices. But the shape of the ashes also matters. The cross. In the midst of the mess, the brokenness, Jesus claims you as His own: You are mine.

Jesus hasn't claimed your heart alone, He has also claimed your sin. And therein is the beauty; Your heart isn't where it should be, but it is good.

It is so good that God was willing to die for it.

The ashes mean I am a sinner, but the cross means I have a saviour.

The ashes may mean that I am not who I could be, but the cross means that there is a God who is working in me - the genuine me - and believes so fully in me, that He is making me into the person He believes I can be.

Return to God. Return to The Genuine in you. Metanoeite. And believe in the Gospel.

Lenten prayer, by Kevin Schneider SJ

When I go now to my inner room,

God my Father, Creator of my inmost self,

I go with ashes on my forehead and in my soul

for what I have done

and for the little love I return to You.

Is it repentance enough that I accept as mine

the burden laid on all of us by all of us?

May I embrace as my own and offer to You

the sufferings of the world that invade my day-

the child in terror, the man without work,

the woman wrapped in oppression and disdain?

Let me feel the grief that weighed like lead on Jesus' heart

and know His unyielding love for me.

Amen