Blessed with this cross

There is something intensely moving about queues in a church. The diversity of backgrounds, nations and ages... the fragile alongside the healthy; each one with our own story, our gifts and our burdens... all coming forward in our need and desire for the God who longs only to give himself, more and more. And yesterday, during Mass, we queued twice, the first time being to receive ashes on our foreheads, as we embarked, alone and together, on our Lenten journeys.

Ideally, we are marked with ashes in a sign of the cross - but as you can see, mine didn't quite get there. As we stepped forward there was a family on my right - small children and their mother - all receiving ashes together. I assumed the man immediately behind them was their father, and that he would want to be with them, but he hung back. In a moment, the priest turned towards me, and a blackened, ashy thumb approached my forehead just as I realised that my hair had flopped forward. The priest very deftly and kindly managed to avoid ashing my impromptu fringe, and the hand with which I hastily swept it back, but in the process... Well... others, better prepared, received a neat, clearly defined cross, whereas mine... mine was somewhat abstract!

And isn't this how God comes into our lives? Sometimes silently, or else with a sudden, surprising whoosh and a swoosh; often when we're looking elsewhere; often, too, in messiness; rarely how, or when expected. God comes into our lives whenever, wherever, regardless of our preparedness, bringing blessings and crosses which are never neat or symmetrical - but which are ours, created especially for us - calling us to sweep aside whatever stands in the way of his action and his glory within us. 

A badly-timed flop of hair... a reminder about how easily I can become distracted from what God is offering; how easily I can seek to impede his life within me. 

And with these thoughts, and blessed with this cross, I began my Lenten pilgrimage... 

However we began this season, however badly or well we feel we are keeping it, let's pray for each other in these coming weeks, as we seek to move whatever may block God's way.