Ash Wednesday

We sang taize songs in a hushed candlelit sanctuary then filed forward slowly, dropping the tiny piece of paper with our handwritten confessions into the flames; then forward further where Harry smeared the ashes from last year's burnt palm-sunday-palm-branches in the sign of a cross on our forhead and said, "From dust you came, to dust you shall return." Then, after the reading of many psalms, and more quiet, we came forward into a circle, shared communion and watched the simple beauty of Harry moving around the circle, wiping our forheads clean, watching our friends and then finally our turns as he said "Your sins are forgiven by the blood of the lamb; go in peace."