Ash Wednesday Opens Heaven for Catholics

Today is Ash Wednesday, the first day of Lent and the start of a 40-day fasting period for Catholics around the world.

The season of lent is made up of 40 fasting days and 6 non-fasting Sundays from Ash Wednesday to Holy Saturday before Easter Sunday.

The 40-day fasting period reflects the suffering endured by Jesus when he fasted in the wilderness of the desert before beginning his ministry. While the 6 non-fasting Sundays offers us the opportunity to bond with family and friends and meet them at their point of need.

See the photo after the cut for Good Deeds for Lent 2016 a list of things you can do during this year's lent season

Mass Reading for 2016 Ash Wednesday

First Reading Joel 2:12-18

"Yet even now," says the LORD, "return to me with all your heart, with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning; and rend your hearts and not your garments." Return to the LORD, your God, for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love, and repents of evil. Who knows whether he will not turn and repent, and leave a blessing behind him, a cereal offering and a drink offering for the LORD, your God? Blow the trumpet in Zion; sanctify a fast; call a solemn assembly; gather the people. Sanctify the congregation; assemble the elders; gather the children, even nursing infants. Let the bridegroom leave his room, and the bride her chamber. Between the vestibule and the altar let the priests, the ministers of the LORD, weep and say, "Spare thy people, O LORD, and make not thy heritage a reproach, a byword among the nations. Why should they say among the peoples, `Where is their God?'" Then the LORD became jealous for his land, and had pity on his people.

Responsorial Psalm Psalms 51:3-6, 12-14, 17

Have mercy on me, O God, according to thy steadfast love; according to thy abundant mercy blot out my transgressions. Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin! For I know my transgressions, and my sin is ever before me. Against thee, thee only, have I sinned, and done that which is evil in thy sight, so that thou art justified in thy sentence and blameless in thy judgment. Create in me a clean heart, O God, and put a new and right spirit within me. Cast me not away from thy presence, and take not thy holy Spirit from me. Restore to me the joy of thy salvation, and uphold me with a willing spirit. O Lord, open thou my lips, and my mouth shall show forth thy praise.

Second Reading 2 Corinthians 5:20--6:2

So we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We beseech you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. Working together with him, then, we entreat you not to accept the grace of God in vain. For he says, "At the acceptable time I have listened to you, and helped you on the day of salvation." Behold, now is the acceptable time; behold, now is the day of salvation.

Gospel Matthew 6:1-6, 16-18

"Beware of practicing your piety before men in order to be seen by them; for then you will have no reward from your Father who is in heaven. "Thus, when you give alms, sound no trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may be praised by men. Truly, I say to you, they have received their reward. But when you give alms, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your alms may be in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you. "And when you pray, you must not be like the hypocrites; for they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and at the street corners, that they may be seen by men. Truly, I say to you, they have received their reward. But when you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you. "And when you fast, do not look dismal, like the hypocrites, for they disfigure their faces that their fasting may be seen by men. Truly, I say to you, they have received their reward. But when you fast, anoint your head and wash your face, that your fasting may not be seen by men but by your Father who is in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you.

Readings from EWTN Catholic Daily Mass Readings

Ash Wednesday Prayer

Jesus, you place on my forehead the sign of my sister Death: Remember you are dust, and to dust you shall return.

How not hear her wise advice? One day my life on earth will end; the limits on my years are set, though I know not the day or hour. Shall I be ready to go to meet you? Let this holy season be a time of grace for me and all this world.

Teach us to number our days aright, that we may gain wisdom of heart.

O Jesus, you place on my forehead the sign of your saving Cross:Turn from sin and be faithful to the gospel.

Source: Catholicgo.org

What is Ash Wednesday

Ash Wednesday. —The Wednesday after Quinquagesima Sunday, which is the first day of the Lenten fast. The name dies cinerum (day of ashes) which it bears in the Roman Missal is found in the earliest existing copies of the Gregorian Sacramentary and probably dates from at least the eighth century. On this day all the faithful according to ancient custom are exhorted to approach the altar before the beginning of Mass, and there the priest, dipping his thumb into ashes previously blessed, marks upon the forehead—or in the case of clerics upon the place of the tonsure—of each the sign of the cross, saying the words: “Remember man that thou art dust and unto dust thou shalt return.” The ashes used in this ceremony are made by burning the remains of the palms blessed on the Palm Sunday of the previous year. In the blessing of the ashes four prayers are used, all of them ancient, and the ashes are sprinkled with holy water and fumigated with incense. The celebrant himself, be he bishop or cardinal, receives, either standing or seated, the ashes from some other priest, usually the highest in dignity of those present. In earlier ages a penitential procession often followed the rite of the distribution of the ashes, but this is not now prescribed.

There can be no doubt that the custom of distributing the ashes to all the faithful arose from a devotional imitation of the practice observed in the case of public penitents. But this devotional usage, the reception of a sacramental which is full of the symbolism of penance (cf. the cor contritum quasi cans of the “Dies Inn”) is of earlier date than was formerly supposed. It is mentioned as of general observance for both clerics and faithful in the Synod of Beneventum, 1091 (Mansi, XX, 739), but nearly a hundred years earlier than this the Anglo-Saxon homilist Aelfric assumes that it applies to all classes of men. “We read”, he says, “in the books both in the Old Law and in the New that the men who repented of their sins bestrewed themselves with ashes and clothed their bodies with sackcloth. Now let us do this little at the beginning of our Lent that we strew ashes upon our heads to signify that we ought to repent of our sins during the Lenten fast.” And then he enforces this recommendation by the terrible example of a man who refused to go to church for the ashes on Ash Wednesday and who a few days after was accidentally killed in a boar hunt (Aelfric, “Lives of Saints”, ed. Skeat, I, 262-266). It is possible that the notion of penance which was suggested by the rite of Ash Wednesday was reinforced by the figurative exclusion from the sacred mysteries symbolized by the hanging of the Lenten veil before the sanctuary. But on this and the practice of beginning the fast on Ash Wednesday seeLent.

Source: Catholicsay.com

The History Behind Ash Wednesday Traditions

Ash Wednesday is inextricably linked to Easter. After all, it marks the beginning of the Lent penance period that ends on that important Christian holiday. But, even though the Easter story takes place in biblical times, the traditions of Ash Wednesday aren’t quite that old.

“The practice of Ash Wednesday dates back to the 11th Century,” says Lauren F. Winner, a priest and assistant professor at Duke Divinity School. “You see that in the book Daniel in the nine chapter there’s a line about associating fasting with ashes, so ashes are associated with penance, which is the dominant theme of Lent.”

And the most familiar Ash Wednesday observance—the ash crosses worn on the foreheads of many churchgoers—hasn’t always been acknowledged by all branches of Christianity, Winner says. It wasn’t until a few decades ago that the tradition became widespread in the United States.

In the 1970s, the practice matched up with a few wider trends in American religion, including the embrace of once-discarded traditions and the search for ways to connect the physical body to spiritual life. Ash Wednesday was an opportunity for a multi-sensory way of connecting faith to the body, so many American Christians at the time decided to begin wearing that outward physical mark of their spiritual lives. Winner says she thinks its popularity has endured as it offers those celebrating an easy way to prompt conversations about faith.

“We’ve seen the rise of a whole array of bodily practices and this is a very striking one for those who are not necessarily comfortable talking about faith,”she says. “The practice of this once a year is an organic way of drawing their faith into their lives.”

Source: Time.com

How Ash Wednesday Opens Heaven for Catholics

Ash Wednesday opens the day to the season of Lent when Catholics are called to sincere repentance and sober reflection on the way of Jesus Christ's passion, death and resurrection.

They are called to turn away from evil and corruption and turn to God for solution.

Catholics all over the world are also called to melt God's heart with acts that include repentance, alms giving, fasting, abstinence and prayers.

Heaven is once again open in this season of Lent.


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