The Maker of Dust

In celebration of Ash Wednesday...

In the quiet dark of the chapel, he reaches to unfold the kneeler and his tired legs bend, weary bones popping. His elbows find the back of the pew. His worn, wrinkled hands clasp. His crumpled frame genuflects in prayer. Were he able to pick himself up from such a position, he would have chosen to prostrate himself, right there in the aisle - to melt away into the thin, dusty carpet, become nothing more than that. And this is what he prays as he kneels. That he is dust, and to dust he shall return.

His hands hold a tremor, and his shoulders shiver from the awkward position while his parched lips speak in silence, confessions of sins long forgotten by all but him and the One to which he prays. Pleading in penitence. Vowing repentance, then stilling his soundless words when he remembers not to be hasty before God with a vow. So, slowly, in few words, he changes his vow to a desperate hope. This, after all, is the nature of his prayers.

There is a depth to the little room that he has not noticed before. A spaciousness in it that the quiet has brought out. He feels small. There in the chapel, he feels he is shrinking. Eroding. Dissipating dust. Let me retain only that which is essential, he prays. Only that which is pure and vital ... and if there is nothing, let me cease to be. Let me disintegrate to dust, and let me be captured up in you.

Not even dust escapes through Your fingers. He is comforted by this thought, and a thin smile, hardly noticeable behind the penitent grimace, curves his mouth. He looks down at his clasped hands, sees the dirt and grime of the world upon them, the blood and the death. He sees these things there behind the skin, where soap and water does not reach. He sees them there, corruption soaked into dust, and squeezing his eyes tighter, he prays all the more.

He hears the minister speak, but does not move. The voice echoes in the room that has grown so large. Still, he wonders if it is large enough to hold his sins. Yet even as the quiet wraps around him, shrinking him into nothing, the words find his hungry ears. "In returning and rest you shall be saved. In quietness and confidence shall be your strength."

And it happens that he realizes the cavern-like chapel, gaping larger than he has ever known it, is not to serve as a storehouse for sin, but a palace of peace. The yawning space around him is not empty, but has stretched and grown to accommodate something much grander. He opens his eyes again to view his hands, and there, perched before him, elbows on the pew, they suddenly appear clean, even beneath the skin.

He understands now that he is not shrinking, not dissipating away, but changing, becoming something new, something still composed of dust, but possessing a wind-like strength that comforts his weary knees and stills his trembling hands. He now feels a spaciousness within, filled with a billowing, peaceful whisper, words he cannot fully recognize, but residing inside, repeating encouragement he will carry with him like a blanket. And the largeness of the room, like a gaping mouth, is most certainly filled with something like a breath, gentle and sweet, capturing him, the minister, and all other mendicants up in a rest that floods over them like true love in the heart.

Again, he prays that he is dust, and to dust he shall return. Yet he takes joy in this, for within the quiet about him, and the whisper within, he feels the presence of the Maker of dust.