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Okay. Re: Ash Wednesday. I’m going to delete my other thread, because I definitely have a goal of never writing anything that about which someone could reasonably ask, did Covid write this?….
(Apologies; there was some good stuff in there from others that I’m sorry to lose.) 1/
(Apologies; there was some good stuff in there from others that I’m sorry to lose.) 1/
I stand by 100% that idea that *with Covid as we have known it so far,* a walk-up, outdoor station, with the person administering ashes masked & shielded, & good hand hygiene between households (a soap & water station - it’s not hard) would have been quite safe.
I just timed myself walking over to my kid from about eight feet away, marking a cross on her forehead, and walking away again. About 8 seconds. That is really really minimal risk - especially outside. Or - at least it was.
But: B117. We just don’t know enough yet about *how* it spreads so much faster. It’s possible that even that *very* brief time up close, or even a few minutes 8 - 10 feet distance outdoors, is substantially higher risk with this new strain.
Maybe we’ll know more in a few weeks. Maybe we won’t.
(Side note: If it turns out this is true, then sprinkling ashes on people isn’t going to be any better. Just saying.)
(Another side note: I wish I’d stressed the outdoors more in my original thread. It’s just the default for me at this point. I’m pretty Covid-cautious & try to avoid being indoors with anyone but the people I live with. With Covid as we have known it, outdoors is a LOT safer.)
It’s totally reasonable to make extra-cautious decisions in light of B117’s unknowns. (Though part of what has gotten my goat about all this is the “well of COURSE we can’t do ashes, that’s silly” from some quarters without any apparent real grounding in the epidemiology.)
BUT that does not mean ashes are off the table. A couple more thoughts about that - one logistico-liturgical and one liturgico-theologico-pastoral.
FIRST: No administration of ashes at church does not mean no administration of ashes.
FIRST: No administration of ashes at church does not mean no administration of ashes.
Ask your Christian formation friends: they’ve spent ten months putting out stuff for families to pick up, or mailing out loving little packets, to use during worship or Sunday school at home.
The Ash Wednesday rite literally says, “The ashes are imposed with the following words.” Passive voice. It doesn’t have to be an ordained person. It doesn’t have to be a liturgical leader. It could be you. It could be your family member or housemate.
The jump from “it’s not safe for clergy to administer ashes” to “sorry, no ashes” is a symptom of the deep clericalism of the Episcopal Church. May God forgive, heal, and reform us.
Do the Ash Wednesday service online. (Do it several times! 8am, noon, 7pm! It’s short and powerful! Laypeople could lead it!) Invite people to join online and, if they like, to mark a cross on their own foreheads at the appropriate time.
On Zoom the liturgy leader can even get fancy and name each person in turn.
I got small containers for people to pick up at church, but you could put some ash in tiny baggies and mail it to everyone. Or everyone who wants it. You have plenty of time if you get on it now.
No dry palms left from last year to burn? Me either. But that’s just a custom, though a lovely one. You can literally buy ashes on Etsy. Or just, you know, burn some stuff in a backyard fire bowl.
I usually mix in a little oil to make it smear nicely. I’ll probably do a little more this year to make it go into the containers nicely & not fly out when people open them. If I were using baggies, I might use pure ash? I dunno.
Which brings me to the liturgico-theologico-pastoral point: Why do all this? Why go to the trouble? Why not just not have the ashes this year?
A couple of folks have wondered why we need the ashes when people just need to look at the news in the morning to be reminded of their mortality. Kind of an “isn’t life enough of a bummer right now WITHOUT Ash Wednesday?” perspective.
This perspective surprised me a lot the first time I read it. Genuinely. I put a question out on Facebook, asking: If Ash Wednesday is familiar to you, do you feel like you need it LESS or MORE this year? As a specific day with rites that speak unflinchingly about your mortality?
I didn’t expect it but a noticeable pattern emerged quickly. Here’s my very fancy diagram.
(Image description: Handwritten diagram, four-box grid. Clergy or church professionals who say they need Ash Weds more this year: Five. Same, but Less: Eight. Laypeople who say they need Ash Wednesday more this year: 12. Same, but less: Two.)
It’s not absolute but there are a LOT more laypeople saying, I need Ash Wednesday this year. I need my church to talk about mortality.
Some of them said as much, really beautifully.
Some of them said as much, really beautifully.
B said, “This year, I don't need a reminder of [mortality] - it's everywhere. Maybe I need... help finding a container to put it in?”
One of the “clergy more” people said, “I NEED my God to come down and be in the midst of all this death with me.”
Other beautiful responses too.
Other beautiful responses too.
It made me think: while clergy are worrying about logistics, are we listening to the people of our parishes?
My husband - a faithful layperson, a scholar of religion - has a hypothesis that many laypeople may be yearning for the church’s ritual naming of the death that surrounds us and threatens to consume us, our bringing it into holy space. Meanwhile...
... clergy may feel like we’ve been doing that all year - handling funerals and bereavements as best we can. (When clergy say they think people are too tired of death to really want Ash Wednesday this year, maybe they're talking about themselves?)
At the very least I think that lay/clergy divide should encourage clergy to do some asking and listening to your congregations. Don’t make assumptions.
I myself (priest) am a strong More, as may be obvious. I wonder if part of the difference is in whether you experience the rite as REMINDING you of your mortality, which, sure, nobody needs any more of that right now; or as SACRALIZING MORTALITY.
Those words aren’t perfect but it’s as close as I can get right now?
For me Ash Wednesday isn’t just a reminder of my mortality and that of everyone I love, but a placing of our mortality within the framework of God’s mercy.
For me Ash Wednesday isn’t just a reminder of my mortality and that of everyone I love, but a placing of our mortality within the framework of God’s mercy.
Yes, we’re broken, and limited, and riddled with the HPtFTU, and mortal; we will go back to the dust.
And God is still God of all of that, every second, every molecule, every delight, every loss. That’s the big truth I submit to when I submit myself to Ash Wednesday.
And God is still God of all of that, every second, every molecule, every delight, every loss. That’s the big truth I submit to when I submit myself to Ash Wednesday.
And that, I need more this year than ever.
Do the ashes, themselves, matter? Yes. They’re one of the church’s most effective symbols. They’re simple - a young child gets the general idea - and yet also many-layered and subtle.
Receiving and wearing ashes is a distinctive embodied experience. Every year there will be a moment sometime in the afternoon where my forehead feels weird and I reach up and it’s gritty and I think: …. Oh, yeah.
Church has been short on embodied experiences this year. This is an important one for a lot of people. And it’s really not that hard, logistically, to make it available to those who want it.
Please don’t make unilateral decisions about what people need or should need in this tender, difficult time. Naming mortality in church, marking ourselves before God as dust, may be one of the most pastorally important things we do this Lent.
As I said in my original thread: Let's not make all this harder and sadder, it is already plenty hard and sad
