Marked by Ashes, Placed in the Story

Something else on Ash Wednesday, admittedly two weeks late: Lutheran pastor Gregory Alms’ essay on Ash Wednesday , originally published in the Concordia Theological Quarterly . It begins:

Ash Wednesday is the story of a marriage. It is the account of an unlikely union.  Humanity and the soil are the improbable partners. The tale of these Ash Wednesday nuptials stretches back to Genesis, chapters two through eight. The earth is the silent but crucial character in these opening chapters. The key to each of these stories and the key to Ash Wednesday is the dirt.

This narrative of the union of man and the earth is played out liturgically on Ash Wednesday. It is a quick, repetitive  moment of ritual: ashes, the motion of a cross, and a few words. Yet by it, we are placed directly into the foundational narrative of humanity. This imposition of ashes is not pedagogical. On the first day of Lent, we are not “told” about creation or taught the doctrinal import of the fall or the story of Cain. In fact, the appointed readings for the day ignore the opening chapters of the Jewish Bible. What Ash Wednesday does is place us in the story. We become actors in the narrative. The story happens to us in a visceral, tactile way.

Here, for those of  you who are interested, are his “On the Square” essays  Small Towns , Santa Claus and the Christmas Wars , and On Being a Pallbearer .