Alva Review-Courier -

About this time last year I was preparing for an Ash Wednesday service and trying to teach my then 6-year-old son about that day on the church calendar. Ash Wednesday is the first day of Lent, a season of preparation before Easter. On that day, many Christians gather together to offer songs and prayers of confession and to receive ashes, an ancient symbol of repentance, in the shape of a cross on their foreheads.

As I talked with my son about this practice he said, "Do you put ashes on everyone?" I got this mental image of me walking down main street, smudging ashy crosses on the foreheads of...