In Eastern Christianity, the journey began two days ago on Clean Monday, the first day of Great Lent, a day of fasting, forgiveness, and even kite flying beneath a widening spring sky.
At first glance, ashes and kites do not seem to belong together. Dust and delight. Repentance and springtime. But perhaps they speak the same truth in different dialects. Genesis tells us: “Then the Lord God formed the human from the dust of the ground, and breathed into their nostrils the breath of life.” Genesis 2:7
Ash Wednesday reminds us that we are dust. Clean Monday reminds us to be clean of heart. But Genesis reminds us of something even more radical: this dust breathes. Not ordinary dust, but God-breathed dust. Animated by spirit, infused with divine breath. We are held together by grace.
Ash does not humiliate us.,it recalibrates us. It brings us back into right relationship, with God, with the earth, with one another. No hierarchy survives at the level of dust.
No race, no wealth bracket, no citizenship category endures there. The billionaire and the prisoner share the same origin story. The policy-maker and the deported body come from the same burning stars. Clean Monday emphasizes forgiveness before fasting
On Clean Monday, Orthodox Christians begin Lent not with ashes but with Forgiveness Vespers. Before the fast deepens, people bow to one another and say, “Forgive me.” And the other responds, “God forgives.” So Lent begins not with self-denial, but with reconciliation. The Old Testament reading appointed for that day comes from Isaiah: “Wash yourselves and be clean; cease to do evil, learn to do good; seek justice, rescue the oppressed…” Isaiah 1:16–18
Cleanliness here is not scrubbing hands. It is about reordering the heart. Justice is part of purification. Compassion is part of fasting. And then comes the Gospel warning from Matthew: “When you fast, do not look dismal… anoint your head and wash your face.”
The Orthodox even call this first week “Clean Week,” and in Greece, Clean Monday is marked with fresh bread, lagana, and the flying of kites. The springtime of the Fast has dawned, they sing. The flower of repentance has begun to open.
Repentance, then, is not gray and joyless. It is green. It is windborne. It rises. Like me many hear the Ash Wednesday words,“Remember you are dust” as diminishment. But as I listened to Diana Butler Bass's recording of her "Cottage sermon" today, I was struck that the Church has always meant something deeper about who we are. We are dust that matters.
Ash refuses both arrogance and despair. It will not let us pretend we are gods. But it also will not let us believe we are nothing. It tells the truth: we are temporary and sacred at the same time. And that truth levels us. No one gets to pretend they are more than human. No one gets to declare another less.
To deny someone’s dignity is not merely political harm; it is a theological error. It is a lie about what a human being is. Before you were a citizen, before you were categorized or labeled or sorted, you were dust in God’s imagination.
Belonging is older than law. Dignity is deeper than policy. Identity precedes permission. For me, Lent 2026 begins here this morning.
When Eastern Christians bow in mutual forgiveness, they enact this truth. When Western Christians receive ashes, they embody it. Different gestures. Same confession.
We all come from the same sacred ground. The kite lifted into the sky on Clean Monday becomes a kind of parable, earthbound hands releasing something into heaven’s wind.
Perhaps that is what Lent is. A season of remembering that the dust we are is not abandoned, but also animated. Isaiah’s invitation still stands:
“Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be white as snow.”
Lent is not about proving our seriousness. It is about receiving mercy.
So today, whether we begin with ashes or with forgiveness bows, whether we fast in silence or break lagana under a blue Greek sky, we remember that we are dust.
We also remember whose breath fills it.
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