Ash Wednesday 2016

Today, February 10, 2016, marks the beginning of the Lenten Season and almost everyone in the Christian world observes this beginning with Ash Wednesday. Ash Wednesday is a day of fasting, abstinence and repentance. The Latin Catholic Church or the Roman Catholic Church follows the regular Sunday Eucharistic celebration schedule --there is a celebration of the Holy Eucharist every hour in your parish most likely.

In the early days, Christians adopted the use of ashes as a symbol of penance. The Bible makes no specific mention of Ash Wednesday, but practices observed during the day such as mourning in sackcloth and ashes are found all throughout the Old and New Testaments. According to Wikipedia we can find the significance of ash in the bible:

"Ashes were used in ancient times to express grief. When Tamar was raped by her half-brother, "she sprinkled ashes on her head, tore her robe, and with her face buried in her hands went away crying" 2 Samuel 13:1. The gesture was also used to express sorrow for sins and faults. In Job 42: 3-6, Job says to God: "I have heard of thee by the hearing of the ear: but now mine eye seeth thee. Wherefore I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes." The prophet Jeremiah calls for repentance by saying: "O daughter of my people, gird on sackcloth, roll in the ashes" Jeremiah 6:26. The prophet Daniel recounted pleading to God: "I turned to the Lord God, pleading in earnest prayer, with fasting, sackcloth and ashes" Daniel 9:3.  Just prior to the New Testament period, the rebels fighting for Jewish independence, the Maccabees, prepared for battle using ashes: "That day they fasted and wore sackcloth; they sprinkled ashes on their heads and tore their clothes" Maccabees 3:47 and 4:39. Examples of the practice among Jews are found in several other books of the Bible, including Numbers 19:9, Jonah 3:6, Book of Esther 4:1 and Hebrews 9:14. Jesus is quoted as speaking of the practice in Matthew 11:21 and Luke 10:13: "If the mighty works done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago (sitting) in sackcloth and ashes."   

It is meaningful and important that this season, members of the church are encouraged to focus on renewal of one's spirituality and that Christ died on the cross for our sins.

Here's a video from Catholic Online's YouTube Chanel to help us understand further about the season: