The meaning of ashes on our foreheads takes us to the ground of our beings where God’s truth and mystery dwells. In awe, we stand gazing at our own lives and moments of wonder that help us to gaze at the cross with humbled and expanded hearts. From ashes to awe to the cross we stand in our truth before the crucified one and allow God to be God.

Allow this Lenten poem to lead you from ashes to the cross, from the ground of our being to the love and mercy of God, to transformation as we return to God.

You may know all the Catholic things about Lent: the ashes, the abstaining from meat, the giving up something, no “alleluias,” the fasting and giving alms. What you may not know is that none of this matters unless we know three unexpected things.