Beloved Dust at Harborview

 

Ash Wednesday invites us to remember how fragile and finite we are. In a hospital, that invitation feels especially real, as life’s vulnerability is encountered here every day.

For one of my seminary classes, we were invited to write a collect, so I put one together for Ash Wednesday. Today, I had the gift of using it with those at Harborview who asked to receive the imposition of ashes. I also wrote the words “beloved dust” on small rocks to share as a tangible reminder to carry with them.

Almighty and merciful God,

you formed us from dust and to dust we shall return.

As we are marked with ashes,

strip away our illusions

and teach us to number our days as beloved dust

that we may come full circle in Your love

and live more fully in Your grace.

through Jesus Christ our Lord,

who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit,

one God, now and forever.

And I read this favorite from Jan Richardson as well: 

Blessing the Dust – A Blessing for Ash Wednesday

All those days
you felt like dust,
like dirt,
as if all you had to do
was turn your face
toward the wind
and be scattered
to the four corners

or swept away
by the smallest breath
as insubstantial –

did you not know
what the Holy One
can do with dust?

This is the day
we freely say
we are scorched.

This is the hour
we are marked
by what has made it
through the burning.

This is the moment
we ask for the blessing
that lives within
the ancient ashes,
that makes its home
inside the soil of
this sacred earth.

So let us be marked
not for sorrow.
And let us be marked
not for shame.
Let us be marked
not for false humility
or for thinking
we are less
than we are

but for claiming
what God can do
within the dust,
within the dirt,
within the stuff
of which the world
is made
and the stars that blaze
in our bones
and the galaxies that spiral
inside the smudge
we bear.

—Jan Richardson Circle of Grace

I had the chance to do this at Harborview last year, and I was so grateful to return and lead a service for folks in the cafeteria in the morning and afternoon today. There’s something deeply meaningful about offering ashes in the midst of people’s workday, in the very space where they serve and sustain others. And there we were—hairnets and all—pausing to remember that we are beloved dust.