“‘You must be born again,’ says Jesus. ‘If you want to see the Kingdom of God, you must be born again.’ What does that mean? Some Episcopalians get a little nervous, a little anxious, with that phrase. We associate the phrase at its best with Jimmy Carter, and at its worst with the televangelist. The holy roller. The guy with iridescent teeth and a silky tent revival voice, he and his wife rocking the bouffant hair. Is that what you want from us, Jesus?”

“Guilt, at its best, opens us up. It leads us outside ourselves and turns us toward reconciliation with someone else. Someone who never feels guilt is either Jesus or a sociopath; either they’ve never done anything wrong, or they’ve never felt any remorse for it. Shame, on the other hand, is never healthy. If guilt is the feeling that you’ve done something wrong, shame is the feeling that you are wrong. That you’re not good enough. You’re not strong enough or pretty enough or brave enough, rich enough or tall enough or smart enough. Where guilt leads us to turn out toward another person for forgiveness, shame leads us to turn into ourselves for concealment.”

“For some of us, coming to Ash Wednesday, coming to get the imposition of ashes, feels a little odd. It feels odd because it’s like someone living in a dust bowl being reminded that things are dusty. We know that; we open the news and often enough it reads like Henderson’s letters to a friend: ‘Letters from a Dust Bowl.’ And nevertheless, we come. ‘From dust you came, and to dust you shall return.’ Coughing, tired, struggling for any visibility – we come.”