Homily for March 5, 2014: Ash Wednesday

The other day, I read an interview with a woman in Lebanon, Sister Micheline Lattouf.  Sister Micheline belongs to the Good Shepherd Sisters. Her flock consists of men, women and children who are—literally—running for their lives.

They are refugees. Most of them are Muslim. Many are from Syria.

By one account, over 2.2 million people have been displaced by the war in Syria.  About half of those are children. Many have fled to Lebanon, where the country is struggling to care for people who are poor, and sick, and terrified.

Despite all that, Sister Micheline sees in those suffering people possibility and promise. She sees something better.

“There is an old saying,” she says. ‘The candle that is just smoking, not lit, still has a life in it, still has hope in it.” And she explains: “I believe that even if a person is in a very bad situation, my mission is to show him the spark and light it.”

I can’t think of a more beautiful way for us to think of what we are about to do here today.

Because that, in essence, is the story of Lent.  The story of a spark waiting to be lit … from smoke…and ash. 

Lent, of course, is a time of penance and prayer—a time when we will turn our hearts back to God. We give up things—chocolate or dessert or meat. We fast. We offer alms. We pray more deeply. All of this, we hope, will focus our hearts and souls, drawing us closer to God and preparing us for the great feast of Easter.

It all begins today with the sign of the cross, marked with ashes on our foreheads. It is a way of saying “We are dust. We are sinners. We have work to do.”

But I think those ashes can also be seen another way.

They also say: we are a people who have burned out. Our flame has turned to smoke. The ash is what remains. Our hearts no longer burn with the fervor that they should. We admit we are people of sin and darkness.

During Lent, we are praying to bring back the light.

There is a spark waiting. An ember still glows.

Our job over these 40 days is to bring it alive.

Two thousand years ago, a group of haunted, fearful people gathered in an upper room and prayed. And in that room, tongues of flame appeared. Those people illuminated the world with the Holy Spirit. We still carry some part of that fire with us and within us.

Today, when you leave this place and go into the world, remember that. The ashes show what we were, what we are.

But they also remind us what we can be. By the grace of God, we can be bearers of light.

Throughout this day, every glass door, every bathroom mirror, every reflection in a passing bus or subway car will remind us that we are marked people. We need that stark reminder. We don’t want to forget it.

But that’s not the whole story. It’s only the beginning.

See these ashes and think of the fire waiting to be re-ignited—the embers that will be stirred by prayer and sacrifice and charity and hope.

Remember the words of Sister Micheline: “The candle that is smoking still has life in it, still has hope.”

This Lent, stir the embers into a flame—and pray for that flame of faith to spread.

Pray to set the world ablaze.