February 18, 2026 (Ash Wednesday) - Mother Christine Day

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In the name of one God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

Remember you are dust, and to dust you shall return.

Dust—that thing that lurks under beds and shows up on tops of refrigerators. Being called dust does not boost one's self-esteem. After all, when a cleaning product is called “Endust,” it would seem that dust is something that should be eliminated and destroyed.

So why, on this day which begins the penitential season of Lent, are we all called dust, close up and personal? The answer can't be found directly in the readings for today, although other words are used, such as wretchedness or mortality. Any ideas why we are to remember we are dust?

Think back to the beginning—as in “the beginning.” Genesis 2:7: The Lord God formed the human from the topsoil of the fertile land and breathed life into his nostrils. The human came to life. And the Hebrew word for the human is one you might recognize: Adam.

In other words, we are created out of the dust, and therefore we are dust—with no disparagement meant. It's just that God is God, creator of heaven and earth. And we, we are the creatures, the ones created out of dust in Genesis 2, the second creation story.

“Remember you are dust, and to dust you shall return” is the way that we creatures remember each Ash Wednesday that we are not the ones in charge. The Creator is in charge.

But we have trouble remembering that as creatures we need to turn away from ourselves and toward God, our Creator. Hence the readings emphasizing repentance—metanoia in the Greek—to turn toward or turn back to God.

And the readings that we hear today have been for Ash Wednesday since sometime in the early Middle Ages. But the theology of Ash Wednesday goes back even more anciently to the times of the Hebrew prophets—Joel, Isaiah, Micah, Amos, and Malachi.

Thus our first reading proclaimed:

“Blow the trumpet in Zion;
sound the alarm on my holy mountain.
Let all the inhabitants of the land tremble,
for the day of the Lord is coming near.
Even now, says the Lord,
return to me with all your heart,
with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning;
rend your hearts and not your clothing.
Return to the Lord your God.”

“For he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, and relents from punishing.”

These are ancient, 400 B.C., words of the Lord from the prophet Joel calling the entire nation of Israel back to God. Back then, fasting with weeping and mourning were signs of repentance—or turning back to God.

And while the prophet Joel seems to endorse a noisy sort of repentance—weeping and mourning—he, unlike some of his brother prophets, does not call for other outward signs of repentance, such as ripped clothing or actually sitting in ashes.

Yet 400 years later, Jesus in the Gospel of Matthew wants an even more understated sort of repentance:

“And whenever you fast, do not look dismal, as the hypocrites do, for they disfigure their faces to show others that they are fasting. But when you fast, put oil on your head and wash your face, so that your fasting may not be seen by others.”

And here we all are, moments before an invitation to a holy Lent, which will include penitence and fasting and marking up our faces with ashes.

Something is up here.

And of course, the easy way out would be to say that Ash Wednesday and the Ash Wednesday Gospel lessons are simply examples of ironic paradox. But that's too easy. And that's something Ash Wednesday is not.

Rather, the meaning of Ash Wednesday is deeper than the mere marking of our faces that we wear out into the world.

Ash Wednesday is the beginning of our own preparations to celebrate Christ's death and resurrection and the gift of eternal life. Ash Wednesday, and the whole 40-day season of Lent, is a yearly opportunity to prepare for the renewal of our baptismal covenant.

Hence, Father Steve's Lenten program beginning Sunday as preparation for baptism, confirmation, reception, and reaffirmation is an annual opportunity to renew our ministry as the Body of Christ in the world by consciously focusing—or turning—to God.

It's an annual opportunity to focus on one of our baptismal promises: to persevere in resisting evil and, whenever we fall into sin, repent and return to the Lord.

It's a yearly opportunity to follow, in our own way, Christ's 40 days in the desert as he prepared for his own ministry.

And the ashes are only an outward sign.

The ashes are from the burning of the Palm Sunday palms. These palms represent the palms that hailed Jesus as King and Messiah as he rode into Jerusalem before his crucifixion and resurrection. And these palms were symbols of earthly power, earthly fame, and earthly glory.

And these palms, like the power and fame they represent, are burned and thus symbolize the frailty of our human and creaturely world.

This ancient symbol of palms into ashes reminds us of our own mortality, helping us to embody and actualize this season of preparation and training.

But of course, it's one thing to think that you are mortal and will die. It's a little bit harder to be told, “Remember you are dust, and to dust you shall return,” while someone traces a cross in ashes on your forehead.

Likewise, it's easy to think about turning—or returning, as the prophet Joel says—to God with all your heart. It is a very different and much harder thing to consciously live your life focused on and turned toward God.

And yet that is what we are called to do as followers of Christ.

Ash Wednesday and Lent are our opportunity to concentrate on living toward God and his Christ.

But here's where the ancient practice of penitence and fasting betrays us in turning toward God. Anyone who has unsuccessfully tried dieting knows dieting doesn't work. For with a diet or a fast or giving up something or adding something in, it's just for 40 days. And then, because it's just a diet, we return to life as usual.

And that doesn't produce real change.

But what does work is a conscious lifestyle change. That is, a change to healthy eating, or giving up something permanently, or eating less of something permanently, or maybe adding something permanently. Lifestyle changes do result in real life change.

So our challenge this Ash Wednesday and Lent is to begin such a change—one that results in us turning more toward God and that will continue throughout the rest of the year.

Sometimes it is easier to turn to God when we have fewer things in the way to clutter our time and our relationship with God. And that's why Jesus went into the desert and fasted for 40 days.

And that's why we might also consider giving up or adding something in during Lent.

You and I might consider giving up something to unclutter our lives and enable us to focus on God. Or we might consider adding something like quiet time for meditation, which might help us turn to God.

Or you and I might consider doing what Pope Leo XIV has suggested. It's both a giving up and an adding on. And here I'm quoting Pope Leo:

“I would like to invite you to a very practical and frequently unappreciated form of abstinence: that of refraining from words that offend and hurt our neighbor. Let us begin by disarming our language, avoiding harsh words and rushes to judgment, refraining from slander and speaking ill of those not present and who cannot defend themselves.

Instead, let us strive to measure our words and cultivate kindness and respect in our families, among friends, at work, on social media, in political debates, in the media, and in Christian communities.

In this way, words of hatred will give way to words of hope and peace.”

But such a lifestyle change is not necessarily the only way to turn toward God. It's only a way—if what one is giving up is cluttering one's way toward God.

Each of us can find one thing that seems to obstruct our turning toward God.

For each of us, what we need to do—or not do—to turn to God is different. Different things will prepare each of us to renew our baptismal vows and help us focus on God.

It's not the adding on or the giving up that's important. Rather, the important thing is that the giving up or the adding on changes us by changing how we live and helps us consciously focus and turn toward God.

Like the ash—the outward sign that reminds us of our own mortality and helps us embody and actualize this Lenten season of preparation and training—the giving up or adding on we begin today is only an outward sign of that inward preparation: the turning of our lives toward God with all our hearts throughout the rest of our lives.

Ash Wednesday remembers the gift of eternal life by means of a symbol of mortality—ashes on our foreheads.

Ash Wednesday offers us the opportunity to spend 40 days focusing in a variety of ways on God—not on ourselves and not necessarily on the world around us.

So I invite you to participate fully in Ash Wednesday—an ancient holy day with even more ancient roots—that begins this holy season.

Amen.