Tonight I will conduct my first Ash Wednesday Service. I have taken a poll of clergy persons around the conference office and my mentors. Ashes - dry, with water, with oil, with vaseline. I've had many answers. Several say oil. The Bishop says "dry," but two others say "never dry." The pastor at my home church puts a little vaseline around the edge of the phyxis and dabs a little on his thumb as needed. I have assisted him using this method. It's not great, but I may go with what I know. I did stop and by a package of men's hankerchiefs to have something to wipe on as I need it. I have all of 4 hours to figure this out, so if you have a sure fire method, now is the time to comment!
Lent - I've spent so much of my thought energy preparing for this service, I haven't really thought about what my own Lenten discipline will be. What are you doing?
Lint - I'm beginning to feel a little like pocket lint. You know the stuff you pull out of your pockets and throw away? There has been some kind of hold up in the appointment changes, so I still don't know where I'm going or even if I'm still going somewhere on March 1.
6 comments:
I've done it with oil, but I actually preferred dry. I like the vaseline idea, though, it sounds workable. The oil made the ashes too clumpy and seemed to me to overturn the message of the Matthew gospel.
Usualy a little oil - base massage/ baby oil works well.
I've posted my Lenten disciplines.
Praying you will soon not fel like lint- but then maybe that is OK in Lent!
After coming up with several and rejecting them all, I finally decided on my Lenten discipline last night: daily flossing.
Yeah, I know, it's not much. Some might say it's a silly Lenten discipline. But it's a good habit to get back into when I've let it fall down to just a couple of times a week, and it's really about self-care and giving thanks for the health I have. I need to face the coming months as healthily as possible, physically as well as spiritually and emotionally.
Wish we'd had some oil in ours last night. Spent the rest of the service with ashes falling into my eyes...!
Wow. I didn't know there was so much to know about ashes. :)
You asked about selling prints - bizarre timing! Just this week Jackson promised to put me together a web site. I think I'm going to use imagekind to sell the photos. Go to their site and search on spookyrach. I uploaded the white church/black tree. Thanks!!!
I burn the palm branches from the previous years Palm Sunday. Grind them up into very, very fine ashes and then use olive oil to make a mixture that sticks well.
As a new convert to contact lenses, I would hate to get ashes in my eyes.
Please don't be discouraged about your appointment. You lifted me up during my terrible time. I am lifting you up in my prayers now.
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