Ash Wednesday and Catholic Reading

Today is ASH WEDNESDAY, marking the beginning of Lent.

It is a day of fasting and abstinence from meat, to begin our penitential walk towards Easter.

Mass times at St. Agnes are as follows:

7:00 am, 12:00 noon, 3pm Service, 5:30 pm, 7:00 pm

All Masses include distribution of ashes, and are in the Lower Church

With many thanks to our insightful curator, Karen Celano, you can delve into a faith-related news article each Wednesday! Karen writes:

Today is Ash Wednesday, which of course marks the beginning of Lent. Lent is, as we all know, a time of penitence that is lived through our prayer, fasting, and almsgiving. But, as Dale Coulter reminds us in First Things, Lent is something more: it is also a time for Christians around the world to remember that we are a "race set apart," a sign among the peoples, a people in this world but not of it. As we receive the ashes on our foreheads and begin our forty-day fast, Coulter explains, we not only express our personal repentance for our individual sins, but we also mark ourselves as belonging to a distinct culture, the culture of an eschatological people whose hopes are not founded on the things of this world but on God's redemption of all creation. The practice of prayer, fasting, and almsgiving in communion with the Church"remind [us] about our identity as a new people and [about our] ongoing mission to bear witness to a cosmic event, the dawning of a new age." Practicing Lent is not, then, an individual event; it is, rather, the activity of the Church as the Body of the Christ participating in the eschatological drama of God's redemptive act on behalf of the entire world.

Thus, while Lent is a time for spiritual "withdrawal" into the desert of prayer and personal spiritual growth, it is also a time for evangelization: for preaching repentance to the world. In our new technological age, the internet provides many opportunities for us to practice both personal spiritual growth, to pray in solidarity with fellow Christians, and to reach out to those in need of God's redemptive power in their lives:

1) Fr. Robert Barron of Word on Fire Ministries offers daily reflections during Lent that you can receive via e-mail.

2) The Jesuits have announced their first-ever online communal prayer project, where you can join with Jesuits around the world in daily meditations delivered to your inbox.

3) Busted Halo's yearly fast-pray-give calendar offers practical suggestions for each day of Lent.

4) Blogger Margaret Felice offers seven ways to deepen Lenten observance, including making time to experience sacred art and music as well as making more time to be present to family and friends.

5) Blogger and Catholic speaker Meg Hunter-Kilmer provides us with her "Lenten Boot Camp," with a schedule of readings for each day designed to deepen our understanding of the Paschal Mystery.

6) Blogger Nick Senger compiled a list of 101 Practical Fasting Ideas, broken down into categories based on specific spiritual needs.

Let us all pray for each other during this Lenten season, that we can all help and sustain each other on our holy pilgrimage towards the Cross and Resurrection!