February 18/Ash Wednesday
Have mercy on me, God, according to your steadfast love;
according to your abundant mercy blot out my transgressions. ~ Ps 51.3
If there is any doubt that today we cross the threshold from Ordinary Time and enter the season of Lent, the change in liturgical color from verdant green to penitent purple, and the ashes many of us will receive on our foreheads, will lay that doubt to rest. And our readings drive home the message: now is the time for the great reset. The next forty days will offer us ample opportunity to reflect on, to revise, to repair what is broken in ourselves and our lives: the ways we have hurt, manipulated, or ignored others; the petty judgments and sharp criticisms we have expressed tacitly or openly; our failures of kindness or compassion. Or to use an old-fashioned word from today’s psalm, our “transgressions.” Following the psalmist, echoing his words, we beg God to show us mercy for those transgressions, to wipe out our sins. The plea we utter is intense — the Hebrew is compact and urgent — and the remorse is sharp. Yet as we embark on this spiritual reset, we would do well to remember that penitence is not punishment. The opening chord that our psalmist sounds at the beginning of Lent is not sin, but forgiveness. “Have mercy,” the psalm begins, in Hebrew a single word that occurs nearly thirty times in the Psalms. Structurally, the Hebrew words for “steadfast love” (chesed) and “abundant mercy” (rachamim) occupy the center, each radiating out to envelop us in our remorse. As we strive for a deeper, more honest admission of our failings, we may do so in the knowledge that God longs to re-create, renew, and restore us to his joy, if we but truly seek his mercy.
Loving God, Grant that I may trust in your abundant love and infinite mercy through all the days of Lent. Amen.
For today’s readings, click here: https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/021826.cfm
To hear the Laudantes Consort sing William Byrd’s “Miserere mei Deus,” click here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VQn5c-uMiLA
