The festival of Easter ends the season of Lent, which began on Ash Wednesday. My ministerial duties then involved “ashing” people on their foreheads. “Remember that you are dust and to dust you shall return,” I gravely told each one. Salutary stuff. Easter, on the other hand, is all about resurrection, which proclaims that you are more than dust! The reality that we are made of the same stuff as the rest of the universe and are vulnerable to the laws of physics, chemistry and biology teaches us important life lessons. But the resurrection says that when the lessons are learned and the last breath breathed, there is more. We are dust and ashes, but more than dust and ashes.
Every now and again I persuade a Fellow of King’s College, Cambridge, regardless of any religious affiliation, to take to the pulpit in chapel and address the question Pontius Pilate put to Jesus: “What is truth?” These talks are always fascinating and thought-provoking. A recent one looked to music for a truth beyond words. It made me wonder whether openness to truth and openness to the transcendent are connected.
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