I keep praying that what we do here matters.

These spiritual things, these sacraments, these rituals: I keep praying they make a difference—for me, really; and I guess I hope for you. I pray that what we do here is something more than ritual or sentiment, something more than spiritual therapy. I don’t know, I don’t want to belittle the word therapy, it’s just I think what we’re doing should mean more than that. Otherwise, it’s all just about you, but it’s not about you like that; it’s not about your well-being (certainly not as the world measures it) but about your sacrifice and salvation. It’s about conversion, about existing in the world in such a way that people mistake you for Christ—a frightening notion if you think about it, how these ashes you’ve come to get should mark you for sacrifice. That is, if you understand what’s really going on.

To be made like Christ. That’s what this day and this season should be about; that should be your prayer. But to be like Christ today—to be truly like Christ today—is, as I said, frightening to think about. For, if you have not noticed, we live in a strange world, a divided world. The social body is suffering from some sort of cancer: we hate each other; we lie to each other; we lie to ourselves; we’re tearing ourselves apart; and, to quote the Avett Brothers, “I’m frightened by those who don’t see it.”[1] We’re suffering from some sort of fever of hatred, known only in earlier more horrible, more violent times; it’s hatred so strong that truth no longer matters. It’s like what St. Antony, that great desert hermit, said centuries ago; his words sound like prophecy today: “A time is coming,” he said, “when people will rave and when they see somebody who is not raving, they will attack him.”[2] And we Christians are raving as much as anybody, lost as much as anybody, hating each other sometimes just like everybody else hates each other. I keep thinking of what St. Gregory of Nazianzus asked once while preaching to his angry congregation: “Why in the world,” he asked, “do we disciples of love, hate one another so?”[3] What I am trying to state is the obvious; I am not speaking politically about anybody; I’m talking about all of us; I’m talking about me. I am saying simply what Paul said, that “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.”[4] All of us.

So, what do we do in such a world? There is a line in Orwell’s 1984, a moment when Julia says, “Always yell with the crowd, that’s what I say. It’s the only way to be safe.”[5] I’ll tell you, sometimes the temptation to be like Julia, to yell with the crowd, is, for me, a strong temptation. Maybe it is for you too; maybe you’ve given in to that temptation so long, you’ve lost your way a little. But that’s not what we Christians are called to be; that’s not what we’re called to do. Rather, as I said, we’re called to be like Christ; we’re called not to scream at the world but to offer ourselves in sacrifice, with Christ, for the world—loving our enemies, you’ll remember; loving the poor, you should know by now. This is what we Christians are called to be in this world. This is what we are called to do. These ashes, these sacraments, all the stuff of Lent: that’s what it’s for, to make you that sort of person, someone untainted and independent of the many hatreds which surround us.

I want you to remember a woman by the name of Lucy Dosh. Sister Lucy Dosh was a nun, belonging to the Sisters of Nazareth. When the Civil War broke out, Sister Lucy volunteered as a nurse in Kentucky. She worked as a nurse in a Baptist church, converted into a hospital, taking care of both Union and Confederate soldiers. That’s all she did; she tended to their broken bodies no matter who they were. It wasn’t long, however, that she contracted typhoid fever; she died right after Christmas in 1861. At her funeral, her casket was draped in the neutral flag; her body was carried upriver on a US gunboat; she was escorted by six Union soldiers and six Confederate soldiers. Her death had brought a little pause in the war.[6]

A tiny thing, nothing historic. Sister Lucy didn’t move the needle of history one bit, and I don’t know why I’m even bringing her up to you. Maybe I’m just grasping at straws trying to say that we don’t have to live by so much hatred. Sister Lucy loved the Lord; she loved her neighbor as herself; she offered herself as a sacrifice for others, both the good and the bad; she was only about 22 years old when she died. Again, I don’t know why I’m telling you about Sr. Lucy Dosh. Maybe it’s just I think she would understand what we’re about to do with these ashes and sacraments and all this Lenten stuff. I think she knew what it was all about. I think she knew what sort of person a person should be who does all this pious stuff. Maybe it’s that I pray I can be a little more like Sister Lucy Dosh. Maybe you should too. Because I think we need such people again. We need Christians—Christians, at least, who know what they do. Amen.

[1] Robert Crawford, Scott and Timothy Avett, “Head full of doubt, heart full of promise” (2009

[2] Apophthegmata Patrum, A 25

[3] St. Gregory of Nazinanzus, Oration 22.4

[4] Romans 3:23

[5] George Orwell, 1984, 122

[6] Mary J. Oates, The Catholic Philanthropic Tradition in America, 48

© 2025 Rev. Joshua J. Whitfield