‘To dust you shall return’

On Ash Wednesday people push aside the culture’s pulsating messages encouraging the pursuit of worldly indulgences and acknowledge their mortality and need for repentance. Catholics, and people of other denominations, visit their churches and embrace what may seem like the stone-cold ritual of receiving ashes and being told, “Remember that you are dust and to dust you shall return.”

By participating in Ash Wednesday, Catholics are participating in the liturgical use of ashes that originated in ancient times.

In the Book of Esther, Mordacai put on sackcloth and covered himself with ashes when he heard of King Ahasuerus’ decree to kill all the Jewish people in the Persian Empire.   

Job lamented in sackcloth and ashes after being severely tested. Daniel prophesized that the Babylonians would capture Israel when he wrote, “I turned to the Lord God, pleading in earnest prayer, with fasting, sackcloth and ashes.” 

Sackcloth and ashes were also used as a public sign of repentance and humility before God.

All of the “men and animals” in Ninevah were in sackcloth and ashes when Jonah preached repentance there.

Jesus himself called for repentance in Matthew 11:20-24: “Then he began to reproach the towns where most of his mighty deeds had been done, since they had not repented.

 “Woe to you, Chorazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida! For if the mighty deeds done in your midst had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would long ago have repented in sackcloth and ashes. 

“But I tell you, it will be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon on the day of judgment than for you.

“And as for you, Capernaum:

“Will you be exalted to heaven? 

“You will go down to the netherworld.

“For if the mighty deeds done in your midst had been done in Sodom, it would have remained until this day.

“But I tell you, it will be more tolerable for the land of Sodom on the day of judgment than for you.”

In the Middle Ages those who were about to die were laid on the ground on top of a sackcloth sprinkled with ashes. The priest blessed the person with holy water, saying, “Remember that thou art dust and to dust thou shalt return.” 

Afterwards the priest would ask the person, “Art thou content with sackcloth and ashes in testimony of thy penance before the Lord in the day of judgment?” The dying person would reply, “I am content.”

Eventually, the use of ashes was adapted to mark the beginning of Lent. The earliest editions of the Gregorian Sacramentary, which dates at least to the eighth century, contain the ritual for the “Days of Ashes.”

The Catechism of the Catholic Church underscores how Ash Wednesday sets the tone for entering into that long dusty journey with Jesus during Lent, which it describes as among the “intense moments of the church’s penitential practice” (CCC#1438).

Jesus’ temptation reveals the way in which the Son of God is Messiah, contrary to the way Satan proposes to him and the way men wish to attribute to him.

“This is why Christ vanquished the Tempter for us: ‘For we have not a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tested as we are, yet without sinning’ (Heb 4:15). By the solemn 40 days of Lent, the church unites herself each year to the mystery of Jesus in the desert” (CCC#540).