RETURN TO ME
A reflection for Ash Wednesday
Ash Wednesday stops us in our tracks. No excuses, no distractions—just the blunt truth: Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return. It is not a threat. It is a calling. A call to step away from all that numbs us and return to the One who made us, the One who loves us.
Lent is often framed as a season of giving things up, a time of sacrifice and discipline. But before all that, it is a season of return. A season of turning our faces back toward God, of walking home like the prodigal son, unsure of what awaits—only to be met with arms flung wide in welcome. It is a season of reorientation, of remembering who we are and whose we are.
The ashes are not a mark of shame. They are a sign of mercy. A reminder that even in our frailty, even in the dust and struggle of being human, we are not abandoned. The same God who formed us from the earth bends low to lift us up. The ashes remind us of our mortality, yes, but also of the hands that shaped us, the breath that gave us life, and the love that refuses to let us go.
In the midst of our routines, our distractions, our striving, Lent interrupts with an invitation: Return to me with all your heart (Joel 2:12). Not just with tidy, disciplined resolutions, but with the fullness of our being—our weariness, our doubts, our longing. Lent is not about perfect self-improvement. It is about being gathered in by the God who knows our weakness and meets us there.
Come. Come as you are—tired, unsure, burdened. Come and be marked, not as a failure, but as one whom God refuses to give up on. Let the ashes on your forehead be a sign of grace, a sign that even in the wilderness, even in the dust, God is near.
Lent begins with ashes. But it does not end there. It moves through repentance to renewal, through the cross to resurrection. The path of return is not one of despair, but of hope. We return to the dust, yes, but we also return to the promise: Behold, I make all things new (Revelation 21:5).
This journey is not about proving ourselves worthy of love. It is about realizing that love has already found us. It is about shedding the layers of pretence, of self-reliance, and embracing the vulnerability of being known, truly known, and still embraced.
The practices of Lent—prayer, fasting, almsgiving—are not ends in themselves but means of clearing the clutter that keeps us from seeing God. They help us to slow down, to listen, to make space for the presence of the Divine in our ordinary days. The purpose of Lent is not deprivation but transformation, not punishment but preparation for the joy of Easter morning.
And so, we walk this road together. In ashes and in grace, in sorrow and in expectation, we make our way home. Lent calls us to return, not with fear, but with trust, knowing that even before we take a step, God is already running to meet us.
So come. Come with your burdens, your uncertainties, your weariness. Come, and be met by mercy. Come, and begin again.
This is the expanded version of my reflection that appears in the Teddington Parish March 2025 Newsletter.
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By Sr. Margaret-Thomas MacIntosh-Graham OSB of the Benedictine House of Initia Nova. Sr Margaret-Thomas also writes a Substack called Sanctum Scotia which can be found at sromgrsb.substack.com
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