Ash Wednesday

Without naming it, Ann Voskamp writes today about the evil of radical Islam.

there’s a supernatural evil that slithers into the corners of this world and pythons around hearts and minds until it strangles out the light and we scream against the dark.

...The only Love that can crush undeniable evil is the undeniable love of the Cross.

...God, forgive us for our lack of prayer, because the very root of our lack of growth is almost always a lack of prayer.

...May The 21 who actually died for their faith, compel countless thousands of us to actually live ours.

...Libya. Iraq. Paris. Denmark. Here.

The last seven days of global news may have CNN headlining, rightly or wrongly, as “Religion’s Week from Hell” — but the People of the Cross can look away from the headlines long enough to know:
Whatever we look at is what we become.

What if 40 Days we looked to the Cross — so we might become Cross Love in a world caught in the cross hairs of war and heartache and pain?

...What if the next 40 days is asking The People of the Cross to do more than Give Up something — but to Take Back something?

Take Back taking up our Cross,

Take Back our time so we can turn back to our First Love,

Take Back our hypocrisy and our complacency and our apathy and Love Lavishly,

Take Back our excuses for not committing to Give Back every day in some tangible, real way — to the local food bank, to a woman’s shelter, to the refugees and the foreigners and the Muslims and Hindus and Buddhists and to the forgotten neighbour next door with her meowing stray cat.

Read more here.