Choosing hope

The Christian faith is not sensible. After all, we claim to live in hope that death has no further dominion, that life wins -- errant nonsense in a material sense. And, once we reach a certain maturity, we all learn in our creaky bones that our individual life won't win. We see that for too many around us, life didn't win. And there was nothing "fair" about it.

On Ash Wednesday we are reminded that we come from dust and to dust we will return. (Perhaps stardust?)

Daniel Schultz, a feisty UCC minister, who has been kicking around the progressive blogosphere as long as I have, seems to be currently happily ensconced at Religion Dispatches where he makes himself the scourge of white evangelicals who wallow in terror of cultural erasure. He reminds that we've been enjoined in our old books to "fear not."

Christianity teaches ... that there are worse things than dying (chief among them the hardening of one’s heart), and that life can only be properly lived by surrendering it compassionately to others. That’s what it means for Christians to belong to Jesus. It isn’t remotely radical to say that we believe that Christ gave up his life for God and for the community of people who followed him; Christians give up their lives for Christ, and for one another. (In theory, anyway. Practice is another thing.)

As we contemplate our mortality through the ashes, let's try to at least pretend that we are not afraid and can aim our brief lives more toward hope than fear.