The story that came to me at Ash Wednesday is the story of the Sneeches. If you have not seen it, take 12 minutes and do so.
Here is the thing: the more we elevate our differences (stars or no stars) the more we will all be taken advantage of by some system/person/group. It is not until we all discard our differences that we will be able to fight against these powers of exploitation. Thus another level to Ash Wednesday.
On Ash Wednesday Christians gather together with different looking foreheads. Some of us have more foreheads (thank you genetics :) some of us have wrinkles and some of us have hair covering our foreheads.Ash Wednesday calls us to gather with all our different foreheads. We all are marked with ashes on our foreheads. We come into worship all different, but we leave worship all marked with the same reminder that we all - despite our differences - are all dust. We are all going to die. We all are going to return to the dust. We all are mortal.
