Thoughts for Ash Wednesday
"Therefore, I reprehend myself and do penance in dust and ashes." - Job 42:6
Meditations For All the Days of the Year by Fr. Hamon:
“The ceremony of the ashes invites us to sanctify Lent by penance and mortification, and by the thought of death. We should cheerfully embrace all the mortifications suitable to this holy season, the fasting and abstinence, as well as the crosses sent to us by Providence which we shall encounter. These are the pious dispositions in which we ought to pass the holy season of Lent.
From the most ancient times, ashes placed upon the head have been an emblem of penance and sorrow. The ceremony of the ashes is like a seal which binds us to penance, in such a manner that to receive ashes on our head without having contrition in our heart is to simulate a feeling which we do not possess: it is hypocrisy.
Let us enter heartily into the spirit of penance from the first day of this holy season. The interest of your salvation requires it, for Jesus Christ explicity declares it to be so by His words: “Except you do penance you shall all perish.” (Luke 5). And He teaches it still better by His example: His whole life was nothing but continual penance.
All the saints have imitated Him by performing penance. What right do you have to dispense yourself from it? You have sinned many times, and all sin, even when remitted, demands penance. We have passions to conquer and temptations to combat, and penance is the surest preservative against both.
“O man!” says the Church to you today, “remember that thou art dust and unto dust thou shalt return!” The Church, in making us begin the holy season of Lent with this solemn acceptance of death, by the great sacrifice of all that we have and all that we are, wants us to understand that she looks upon the thoughts of death as the most suitable to make us pass through Lent in a holy manner. That is to say, the most suitable way to fly from sin, to practice penance, and to practice virtue.
The enemies that we have to fight are of two kinds: internal and external. The first are our passions; the second are the devils. Both were brought on us by pride and man’s pride began when he first refused to obey his God. God forgave him his sin, but He punished him. The punishment was death. This was the form of the divine sentence: “Thou art dust and unto dust thou shalt return.”
We must humble ourselves, accept the sentence, and look on this present life as a path to the grace. The path may be long or short, but to the tomb it must lead.
When we see things in their true light, then we shall love God who has designed to set His heart on us despite our being creatures of death. We shall hate, with the deepest contrition, the insolence and ingratitude that we have spent so many of our few days of life in sinning against our heavenly Father. And we shall be not only ready but eager to go through these days of penance which He so mercifully gives us for making reparation to His offended justice.
Isaiah 58:1-9:
Isaiah explains that the privation of food will not please our Lord if we are not trying, at the same time, to struggle against our faults. Our body and our soul have often sinned together, and they must make reparation together.
The Liturgical Year by Dom Prosper Gueranger:
“We are told in this lesson from the prophet Isaiah what are the dispositions which should accompany our fast. God Himself is speaking to us - God who Himself commanded His people to fast. He tells us that the fasting from material food is a mere nothing in His eyes unless they who practice it abstain also from sin. He demands that sacrifice of the body, but it is not acceptable to Him unless the soul goes along with it.
Let the heretics cease to find fault with the Church for her observance of practices which he scorns to be ‘material.’ It is he who is material by his system of letting the body have every indulgence! The children of the Church fast because fasting is recommended in almost every page of the Old and New Testament, and because Jesus Christ Himself fasted for forty days.
But we are fully aware that this practice, which is recommended and urged, is not meritorious unless it is ennobled and completed by the homage of a heart resolved to reform its vicious inclinations.
Prayer
Lord Jesus, enlighten me, show me what displeases Thee, and above all give me the strength to act accordingly. I want to take advantage of this Lent to correct everything in me that prevents me from living a profoundly Christian life.
Eternal source of light, Holy Ghost, drive away the darkness that hides from me the ugliness and malice of sin. My God, inspire in me such a great horror of sin that I might hate it as much as Thee Thyself hates it, if such a thing were possible, and that I might fear nothing so much as to commit it in the future.
Thank you for sharing! This was great to read this morning.