My mother was a by the book Roman Catholic. She followed all the rules. As I child I didn’t really understand what difference it made if I went up to the altar for communion and it was 3 minutes BEFORE the exact time of fasting was met. If we went into any church and forgot or did not have a hat, my mother would use a Kleenex to put on her head and the head of my sisters and me. So much about church was weird to me.
Ash Wednesday was one of the weirdest to me. I was thinking about it this past week and how it didn’t connect me to anything as a child. In fact, it scared me. I didn’t go to Catholic school, so I didn’t have the nuns trying to explain what Ash Wednesday was about. We would go to get ashes at the early mass, before school. It seemed that it was a rule that you couldn’t rub off the ashes on your forehead, so I was teased at the public school I went to. There were a few of us Catholic school kids at my school. When we looked at each other on that day I imagined that they felt the same way as me – embarrassed. I couldn’t answer the question – “why do you have that stuff on your forehead” because I didn’t really know.
Oh- I did know “From dust you came and dust you will return”. I thought it meant – I am dirty, and I will die! Dying was nothing I ever thought of. I was a kid, old people died.
Then there was the “giving things up for Lent” that followed. Again, I didn’t really understand. When I was in my teens and very critical of the church, I watched my mother “give up” alcohol for Lent. She had a loophole though. Sundays were part of Lent but not days of abstinence. So, she drank on Sundays and would explain it by the rubric. The next year she decided that she would only drink wine and then the next year she just drank. I was beginning to understand that she had a problem with alcohol.
This year I found myself reflecting on what Lent could mean to me as a recovering person. Mardi Gras is an alcoholic’s dream. Let’s have a party for days and days, knowing that when Wednesday came you could change your ways and repent. Such a dream for me. I will have fun AND then I will stop drinking. But I rarely did.
When I found AA, the model of Mardi Gras and Lent became something else. It could be a celebration and then a change of heart and mind. The hole in me that would not be filled with more alcohol but rather with my higher power’s help. Giving things up became a time to do more 4th and 10th step work so I would rid myself of my more glaring defects. I could also reach out to others who might be struggling with their disease.
I am dust, we all are, and to dust we will return. Now that I am much older with many years of sobriety, I know this to be true. What will we do with this one precious life? I went to church last week and was blessed and given ashes on my forehead. Now it is a symbol of humility, gratitude and grace.
I appreciate this Ash Wednesday Reflection from Kate Bowler:
Today we begin our journey.
The first day to stop pretending.
To sit with what is fragile.
To let grace sneak in through the cracks
Libbie S.
