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Ash Wednesday: not a day for giving up, but for leaning in to life.
As well, the anniversary of my dad’s sudden death three years ago:
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
