Ashes on My Head

Cenacle Convent, Brighton

Many years ago I had a spiritual director, (sort of a spiritual therapist) an elderly nun; I used to go to see her at the Convent of the Cenacle in Brighton. I’m not sure now how I came to see her there but it was a large imposing building and I would be ushered into a little sitting room and she would come and join me. We would talk for an hour. She was a very kind and generous woman and I’m sure my immature religious anguish tried her patience but she never let on.

One time I saw here on an Ash Wednesday and she told me a story of when she was a young nun living in here community’s convent in Rome. A priest came to the convent to lead the sisters in a retreat day for Ash Wednesday. At the end of the retreat they had a service and the priest distributed the ashes. Instead of putting the traditional smudge on her forehead he sprinkled the ashes on her head. The elderly nun chuckled. She said, “I was furious, here I was a nun in Rome, and I would be walking around all day and no one could see my ashes. What would they think?”

The scripture for Ash Wednesday  

Matthew 6:1-6, 16-21

Beware of practicing your piety before others in order to be seen by them; for then you have no reward from your Father in heaven.

So whenever you give alms, do not sound a trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, so that they may be praised by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward. But when you give alms, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, 4so that your alms may be done in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you.

And whenever you pray, do not be like the hypocrites; for they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and at the street corners, so that they may be seen by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward. But whenever you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you.

And whenever you fast, do not look dismal, like the hypocrites, for they disfigure their faces so as to show others that they are fasting. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward. But when you fast, put oil on your head and wash your face, so that your fasting may be seen not by others but by your Father who is in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you.

Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust consume and where thieves break in and steal; but store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust consumes and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.

My spiritual director gained a lot of wisdom over her many years. She learned that outsides mattered hardly at all. Last year even Pope Francis speaking to an audience of seminarians said, `’If you find a seminarian, priest, nun, with a long, sad face, if it seems as if in their life someone threw a wet blanket over them,” then one should conclude `’it’s a psychiatric problem, they can leave – `buenos dias’”.

The most important element of our spiritual life is in our hearts. God doesn’t pay attention to our outsides; God is not impressed with a spiritual life that is grim and lifeless. God sees only the light that shines from within. That is the light that will be the light in the darkness of the world. Not for gain, not for reward, but the simple consequence of having a relationship with God.

This Lent practice some of this “quiet” “secret” love. Wear your ashes on the top of your head!

Rev. Fred