Ash Wednesday marks beginning of 40-day Lenten season today

A lot of people may view today as an ordinary Wednesday, but this day holds a particular place in the Catholic calendar. February 10 marks the beginning of the 40-day Lenten season, known to Catholics as Ash Wednesday.

 

THE FAITHFUL LINE UP. Office workers from Makati line up just outside the Greenbelt Chapel earlier today to celebrate Ash Wednesday. Lay ministers mark the people with a cross using burnt ash from palm fronds.

 

Lent is the time of the year when most Christians abstain from what most people consider as luxury food: meat, eggs, and dairy products. Devout Catholics in particular fast for 40 days, replicating the time Jesus Christ spent fasting after being baptised by St. John the Baptist.

Ash Wednesday is one of the many “special days” during the Lenten season. It’s the day when the clergy asks their parishioners to do good deeds (usually by giving alms to the poor or other forms of charity work), sacrifice (through fasting or abstinence), and pray for forgiveness from the Lord.

It is marked, both figuratively and literally, by having their foreheads marked with a cross. Priests use the ashes from burned palm fronds of last year’s Palm Sunday (the last Sunday before Easter).

 

CLOSE-UP OF THE CROSS. The cross made from ash symbolizes the desire of Christians to follow Christ.

 

While being marked, the priest or lay minister will often say “Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return”, or “Repent, and believe in the Gospel”, reminding churchgoers to stay humble and be prayerful.

 

YOU ARE DUST, AND TO DUST YOU SHALL RETURN. One of the things the lay minister said during the marking.

 

This year, Manila Archbishop Luis Antonio Cardinal Tagle urged Catholics to support a Church-based feeding program called “Fast2Feed”. The campaign asks people to fast and donate money to the Hapag-Asa program of the Archdiocese of Manila and its dioceses. Donations can be made through Fast2Feed envelopes in various parishes.

According to Tagle, “It only takes P1,200 or P10 a day to bring back a malnourished child to a healthy state in six months.”

Ash Wednesday is the start of the 2016 Lenten Season, which ends on Easter Sunday, March 27.

 

Source: Inquirer.net, Philstar.com, International Business Times
Photos courtesy of: Pat Cordova, Jastine Valeriano, Andrew Del Rosario