What do you make of this Episcopalian initiative to bring ashes out of the churches to the masses? The effort has its own web page and facebook site.
I looked for the sample liturgies and found a few:
- One for “extremely brief” encounters. No Scripture though, not even a verse.
- I like this one a bit more; it includes a good chunk of Psalm 51.
The appeal of Ash Wednesday is strong and deep, even outside of Catholicism. It suggests the claim that the laity have lost a sense of sin may be faulty. That people are willing, though in numbers, to receive a smudge of burned palm on their face suggests a lot of them may indeed be very aware they screw up, fall short, and indeed, have sinned in the sight of God. And their own consciences. Is that something to be worked with? Or do we churched types keep repeating the mantras of our times?
Catholic Sensibility 
I know some will decry the people who go to Mass on Ash Wednesday, but I think we (collectively) need to take a good, hard look at why they’re coming then and not at other times. (Sure, there’s responsibility on their part, too, but it goes both ways.)