2018 Ash Wednesday

Return To Your God

Even now the Lord says,

Return to me with all your heart,

with fasting,

with weeping,

and with mourning;

rend your hearts and not your clothing.

Joel 2:12

Today we are signed with the cross using ashes from the burnt palms of last year’s Palm Sunday.  The Church reminds us of three traditional Lenten practices.

    Fasting                We hunger for our God

    Prayer           Contemplative gaze on Jesus’ Way

  Giving           Sharing our abundance with those in need

God’s Promise found in Ezekiel 36:26    

^{24 "}For I will take you out of the nations; I will gather you from all the countries and bring you back into your own land. ²⁵ I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean; I will cleanse you from all your impurities and from all your idols. ²⁶ I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. ²⁷ And I will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws. ²⁸ Then you will live in the land I gave your ancestors; you will be my people, and I will be your God."

Prayer Together

May God fill our hearts with the love that bears all things,

Believes all things, hopes all things, and endures all things,

Through Christ our brother.  AMEN.

I will take your heart of stone and place a heart within you,

A heart of compassion and love.

ACTION:  Throughout this Lent collect stones of all sizes, color and shape.  Build a sacred pile of stones symbolizing the promise of God being fulfilled in your heart and life. Let them remind you to let go of our ‘Stones’ and to build Strong Relationships in your family, parish, country, our world and the cosmos.