Dust that Sings

Analise Pickerrell, Terrain

"The heart of the wise is in the house of mourning, but the heart of fools is in the house of mirth".

— Ecclesiastes 7:4

How strange it is to be in a room full of people chanting about their depravity. 

There’s a 1957 Swedish film called “The Seventh Seal.” Among other things, it’s about a knight and his struggle with faith and human mortality. I’ve forgotten much about it, but one scene sticks out in particular. A horde of religious zealots trudge through the streets of a village infested with the bubonic plague. In their hands, they brandish whips and flagellate themselves while chanting “Dies Irae.” Day of Wrath. 

I was sitting, or kneeling, during an Ash Wednesday service. The congregants of the church recited a prayer of confession–in unison, we professed our impurities, our shortcomings, our evil desires. “The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit, a broken and contrite heart,” our voices sang. And as my joints began to ache and my arms tingled from lost circulation induced by holding prayer hands for too long, I thought–Should I be feeling mournful right now?

I’ve never been “good” at reverence. I’m not a serious-presenting person, and my goofiness tends to emerge at the worst possible moments. For me, awe or grief arise organically, maybe after summiting a mountain or seeing a loved one’s tears that I caused. But spaces and times meant to encourage these feelings often fail to elicit them. Later in the service, I bent down to the priest (she was a very petite woman) to receive my ashes. “You are dust, and to dust you shall return,” she spoke, forming the cross on my forehead. I smiled at her. I’m not sure if I was supposed to do that.

Did God want to see me broken and screaming out for His grace? Would He like to see my tears mingle with the dark stain on my face and drip down my chin like inky blood? Maybe it would be better to be a medieval peasant with a scourged back and downtrodden face, stumbling through the street, crying, “I am dust. I am dust. I am dust.” But at what point does mourning over my sin become flagellation? At what point am I taking on the punishment for sins that have already been paid for?

We live in an era where pleasure is placed above God, and people recite self-love affirmations instead of taking accountability for the pain they cause themselves and others. Yet there we were, clustered in a room together, singing in major keys about our pitiful origins and imminent demise. But it was strange. In the house of mourning, all I saw was mirth. 

“Happy Ash Wednesday,” I said earlier that day on seeing a professor who bore the mark of the tradition. “Well, I wouldn’t say ‘happy.’ It’s a rather solemn time,” he said. “But it reminds us of the greatest joy–forgiveness.”

Communion was taken, and the room slowly emptied. I met my friends in the courtyard. We hugged and made jokes. Various acquaintances met us with reciprocated smiles and hellos. My friend made me laugh so hard that I forgot about the ashes between my eyes.