Vatican modifies distribution of ashes for Ash Wednesday
Pope Francis distributes ashes on Ash Wednesday 2020
(Vatican Media)
By Vatican News
The health situation caused by Covid-19 continues to forces changes on daily life, which are also reflected in the Church’s sphere.
Ahead of the beginning of Lent, on Wednesday, 17 February, the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments has published a note detailing how Catholic priests are to distribute ashes.
Instructions
After blessing the ashes and sprinkling them with holy water in silence, the priest addresses those present, reciting once the formula found in the Roman Missal: “Repent, and believe in the Gospel” or “Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return”.
At that point, the note continues, the priest “cleanses his hands, puts on a face mask, and distributes ashes to those who come to him or, if appropriate, he goes to those who are standing in their places.”
He then sprinkles the ashes on each person’s head “without saying anything.”
4 comments:
I like the idea of ashes being sprinkled instead of on the forehead. To me the ashes on the forehead contradicts the gospel when saying go to a room and pray privately. It puts on a bit of a show of piety that I feel uncomfortable with.
That's not fair ! You said Europe has a different mode of distributing ashes, but didn't describe it. Here it used to be a little cross on the forehead with the ashes of palm fronds. That changed into the very protestant mixture of palm ash mixed with lamp black applied as a paste or slurry, with a forehead cross large enough to be spotted 100-yards away. To be honest, I think I do know the European method. Its the sprinkling on the head and then the gesture of a cross drawn on the forehead with the phrase spoken. I like the sprinkling on the head for the same reasons as the first commentator. As for saying ashes to ashes, a second priest or deacon or minister could say the verbal part at a safe six foot distance.
Whew! With what comes from Rome nowadays, was afraid it had changed to using a flour sifter with organic flour, which excess captured in a tray in which recipients stood, and this flour used to bake bread for poor Muslims.
Got off light, this time.
In replying to above comments, I admire sprinkling, as sprinkling/throwing ashes was a sign of mourning, however it was not a private prayer method but instead a very public display of woe. But frond ashes mixed with oil and smeared on forehead or sprinked on head (granular? Sounds even less normal ashes than the oil thing) seems inferior to sprinkling genuine frond ashes from own fronds in maintaining the spirit and authenticity.
When both oil/ash/lampblack and granulated are storebought commercial things, bought for ease all the way around from procurement to distribution, it really loses a lot of personal symbolism and significance and even reality. Fits right into electric candles at Mass. Have heen told it an insurance requirement and local ordnance depending on where, either of which could be bucked under protected religion, but which are not. Ask the KOC how concerned they are about insurance while drinking beer and playing with fire. The USCCB can't figure a way to insure some churches and keep candles lit?
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