“Even in a pandemic, Lent is a season of grace and an important moment in the church’s penitential practice,” he told The Pittsburgh Catholic, online diocesan news site. A season of graceįather Tom Kunz, associate general secretary and vicar for canonical services in the Pittsburgh Diocese, said the different approach with ashes “will help the priest or deacon to avoid having direct contact with a large amount of people.” He also said this method is common in other countries. Some dioceses have announced their plans to follow this step. Conference of Catholic Bishops in Washington. The sprinkling of ashes on individual heads would take place without any words said to each person.ĭioceses will respond to this adaptation based on the effects of the pandemic in their respective regions, said Father Andrew Menke, executive director of the Secretariat of Divine Worship at the U.S. It said priests should bless the ashes with holy water at the altar and then address the entire congregation with the words in the Roman Missal that are used when marking individual’s foreheads with ashes: Either “Repent and believe in the Gospel” or “Remember that you are dust and to dust you shall return.” The note on the “distribution of ashes in time of pandemic” was published online in January by the Vatican Congregation for Divine Worship and the Sacraments. 17, many dioceses, including the Archdiocese of Atlanta, will be following the Vatican’s recommendation of a modified method for distributing ashes: sprinkling them on the top of people’s heads rather than using them to make a cross on people’s foreheads. This year, for example, there will likely be no parish pancake suppers on Mardi Gras, as there were just a year ago.Īnd during this year’s celebration of Ash Wednesday Feb. Most churches are open now but are limiting congregation sizes and requiring parishioners to sign up for Masses. It wasn’t until the third week of Lent that dioceses began lifting Sunday Mass obligations and temporarily stopping public Masses. 26 were celebrated just weeks before the coronavirus pandemic hit the United States, so church services and social media posts of people’s ashes followed the usual tradition. Other Catholics will be watching the livestream Mass, as they have been for much of the pandemic, and will of course, not receive ashes.
WASHINGTON (CNS)-Ash Wednesday, as with many other things right now, will have a different look at many Catholic parishes across the United States this year.įor starters, Catholic churches that are often standing-room only on this day-drawing crowds just short of the Easter and Christmas congregations-will be at their pandemic-restricted size limits with members of the congregation spread out in socially distanced seating.
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