Ash Wednesday: March 5

Ash Wednesday marks the beginning of Lent. The Liturgy for Ash Wednesday includes the following explanation. 

Dear People of God: The first Christians observed with great 
devotion the days of our Lord’s passion and resurrection, and 
it became the custom of the Church to prepare for them by a season of penitence and fasting. This season of Lent provided
 a time in which converts to the faith were prepared for Holy 
Baptism. It was also a time when those who, because of 
notorious sins, had been separated from the body of the faithful 
were reconciled by penitence and forgiveness, and restored to 
the fellowship of the Church. Thereby, the whole congregation 
was put in mind of the message of pardon and absolution set 
forth in the Gospel of our Savior, and of the need which all 
Christians continually have to renew their repentance and faith.

 I invite you, therefore, in the name of the Church, to the
 observance of a holy Lent, by self-examination and repentance;
 by prayer, fasting, and self-denial; and by reading and 
meditating on God’s holy Word. And, to make a right beginning
 of repentance, and as a mark of our mortal nature, let us now 
kneel before the Lord, our maker and redeemer. (The Book of Common Prayer, p. 264.)

The repentance that is called for is a turning away from business as usual in the world and to have a new heart. It is to let the world see in us the hope and new life that is possible in Jesus.

Fasting is a discipline that is far from the mainstream of American life. But the pangs of hunger are a reminder of our soul’s greater hunger for meaning that is only satisfied by God and by serving God.

Isaiah is always helpful in cutting right to the heart of things.

Is not this the fast that I choose:
   

to loose the bonds of injustice,
   

to undo the thongs of the yoke,


to let the oppressed go free,
  

and to break every yoke?

Is it not to share your bread with the hungry,
   

and bring the homeless poor into your house;


when you see the naked, to cover them,
   

and not to hide yourself from your own kin? (Isaiah 56:6-7)

Ash Wednesday Liturgy: March 5

• 12:10 p.m. – Christ Church, 20 West First Street
•   7:00 p.m. – First Baptist Church, 111 West Monument Avenue