Calvary Baptist Church

On my way to work this morning I passed the Calvary Baptist Church on 57th St. The inscription over the door read:

"We Preach Christ Crucified, Risen, and Coming Again."

I thought that was cool.

Palm Sunday

I watched the first session of General Conferece at the Lincoln Center building today and then walked home through Central Park. It was one of those miraculously beautiful days. The park was full of people.

When I turned down my street, there were two men holding handfuls of palm fronds, just hanging out on the street corner, like they tend to do in my neighborhood.

One of them asked if I'd gotten a palm frond today, and gave me one.

This was one beautiful Sunday.

Ash Wednesday

Yesterday, I passed a woman on my way to the 110th St stop of the B/C subway line. She had a smudge on her forehead... I noticed but didn't really pause, since it wasn't the weirdest thing I'd seen all day. But then I got on the train and the man across from me had a big dark thumbprint in the middle of his forhead, as did another kid sitting a few seats down from him. Hmmm. Multiple citings of oddities means there is a unifying theme... Oh that's right! 40 days before Easter, Mardi Gras just finished, Lent is beginning... Ash Wednesday.

My church doesn't participate in the practices of Ash Wednesday, although I think its a beautiful gesture/tradition/practice. Wanting to learn more and make sure I was getting my facts straight, I did some googling to brush up on the meaning of the smudgy foreheads. (This is my understanding...)

Ash Wednesday is a day of repentance, signifying the beginning of Lent, which is a period of fasting and personal sacrifice precending Good Friday and Easter, meant to reaffirm faith in Christ and commitment to God. The ash that they put on their forhead is created by burning the palm fronds from the previous year's Good Friday and mixing with a consecrated oil, which is then applied by a priest as he recites the words: "Remember, O man, that you are dust, and unto dust you shall return."

I was really taken with this whole idea and kept repeating the phrase in latin to myself all day long: Memento homo, quia pulvis es, et in pulverem reverteris.

What I found truly moving, however, was how many people I saw yesterday with the ash on their forehead. Every few steps through the crowd, on every subway platform, in every store, on every block I saw people participating in this open expression of faith.