60 Fun Facts About Ash Wednesday

Ash Wednesday marks the first day of which Christian season?

The season is a period of prayer, fasting and almsgiving before Easter.

Which day immediately precedes Ash Wednesday?

It is also called Mardi Gras, Pancake Tuesday or Pancake Day.

What are the ashes used on Ash Wednesday traditionally made from?

Churches often collect the old palms in a basket in the narthex before Lent.

In what shape are the ashes usually marked on the forehead in English-speaking countries?

In Italy and many other countries the ashes are sprinkled on the crown of the head instead.

Which words, based on Genesis 3:19, traditionally accompany the imposition of ashes?

The Latin is Memento, homo, quia pulvis es, et in pulverem reverteris.

What alternative formula, based on Mark 1:15, was given first place in the 1969 Roman Missal?

The older dust formula recalls the words spoken to Adam and Eve after their sin.

How many days before Easter Sunday does Ash Wednesday always fall?

Lent counts 40 days because its six Sundays are not included.

What is the earliest date in February on which Ash Wednesday can fall?

It last happened in 1818 and will next happen in 2285.

What is the latest date in March on which Ash Wednesday can fall?

That requires Easter on 25 April, as it will be in 2038.

In which year will Ash Wednesday first fall on 29 February since the Gregorian calendar was introduced?

It only happens when Easter falls on 15 April in a leap year.

Ash Wednesday coincided with Valentine's Day in 2018 and 2024. When will it next do so?

It also happened in 1923, 1934 and 1945.

To which Roman basilica does the pope process from the Church of Saint Anselm on Ash Wednesday?

Ashes are sprinkled on his head rather than smudged on his forehead.

For Roman Catholics aged 18 to 59, what does the Ash Wednesday fast permit?

The two smaller meals together should not equal the full meal.

From what age does Catholic canon law require abstinence from meat on Ash Wednesday?

Fasting itself applies from 18 to 59.

What is the traditional name for the practice of eating nothing until sunset on Ash Wednesday?

Many Christians in India and Pakistan still keep it on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday.

What is Ash Wednesday called in India?

The name means the sacred ash of the Holy Fast.

Which pope ordered in 1091 that receiving ashes be extended to the church in Rome?

By the end of the 10th century the practice was customary in Western Europe but not yet in Rome.

What did the liturgical books soon call the day after the 1091 order?

It means the fourth weekday of ashes.

To which early pope is the dust-to-dust custom traditionally, and probably wrongly, credited?

Ash Wednesday was not yet part of Lent in his time.

Which Anglo-Saxon abbot wrote around the year 1000 of ashes being strewn on heads at the start of Lent?

The Gregorian Sacramentary of the late 8th century already records the practice.

Which archbishop obtained a 1547 order forbidding the use of ashes on Ash Wednesday as superstitious?

The same order banned candles on Candlemas and palms on Palm Sunday.

What did the 1549 Book of Common Prayer put in place of the ashes ceremony?

The people responded Amen to readings of God's curses against sinners.

The Miserere, traditionally central to the Ash Wednesday service, is which number in the Book of Psalms?

It is the first psalm at Lauds on all penitential days.

Which major branch of Christianity skips Ash Wednesday, beginning Great Lent on Clean Monday instead?

Western Rite Orthodox parishes are the exception.

In the Ambrosian Rite of Milan, when are the ashes placed on the faithful?

The Ambrosian fast then begins on Monday, and its day of abstinence falls nine days later.

What is the 'to Go' movement that began among US churches in 2007 on the first day of Lent?

Anglican priest Emily Mellott of Lombard turned the idea into a movement.

In which Irish town did a priest set up a drive-through ashes station in 2017?

The parish also ran drive-through prayer requests during Lent.

What do children in Iceland traditionally do on Ash Wednesday?

They also dress up in costumes.

In Hungarian villages, what did people do if someone had not received ashes?

The Csángó people of Moldova even cover their pots with ashes for good luck.

What did Victorian-era theatres refrain from presenting on Ash Wednesday?

They offered other entertainment instead, as the Church of England mandated.

Ash Wednesday is National No Smoking Day in which country?

The date links giving up a luxury for Lent with the connection between ash and smoking.

Which Old Testament city repented in sackcloth and ashes after the prophet Jonah's warning?

God spared the city as a result, according to the text.

Which biblical figure declared 'I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes'?

Daniel likewise pleaded to God with fasting, sackcloth and ashes.

Which early Christian writer said confession should include lying in sackcloth and ashes?

Eusebius tells of a repentant apostate who covered himself in ashes to beg readmission to communion.

The 40 days of Lent that begin on Ash Wednesday allude to Jesus fasting where?

They also parallel Moses's 40 days of fasting after the Golden Calf.

What does the word Shrove, in the name of the day before Ash Wednesday, come from?

Christians traditionally confess on the day so as to begin Lent shriven.

What does Mardi Gras, another name for the day before Ash Wednesday, mean?

It refers to eating rich, fatty foods before the Lenten fast.

Why did pancakes become the traditional food on the eve of Ash Wednesday?

Pancake races across the UK owe themselves to the same practice.

The famous pancake race is said to have begun in 1445 in which English town?

A housewife supposedly ran to church still holding her frying pan.

What is the Latin name for Lent, meaning fortieth?

The season prepares Christians for Easter.

Which poet published Ash-Wednesday, often called his conversion poem, in 1930?

He had converted to Anglicanism in 1927; the poem draws on Dante's Purgatorio.

The Ash Wednesday bushfires of 16 February 1983 struck which two Australian states?

More than 180 fires broke out within twelve hours, fanned by winds up to 110 km/h.

How many people died in the 1983 Ash Wednesday bushfires?

Forty-seven died in Victoria and 28 in South Australia.

The Ash Wednesday Storm of March 1962 battered which part of the United States?

The extreme nor'easter lingered through five high tides over three days.

How many people were killed by the Ash Wednesday Storm of March 1962?

It injured more than 1,000 and damaged property in six states.

Which actress starred in the 1973 film Ash Wednesday, about a woman transformed by cosmetic surgery?

Larry Peerce directed it.

Which early church gathering spoke of Lent as a forty-day fast before Easter?

It is unclear whether the fast was meant for all Christians or only those preparing for baptism.

Under Catholic rules, who may bless the ashes on Ash Wednesday?

Laypeople may nonetheless place the blessed ashes on people's heads.

Which fixative does an Anglican website suggest mixing with the ashes?

The Catholic liturgy sprinkles the ashes with holy water when blessing them.

Why, in the early Church, were ashes placed on women's foreheads rather than strewn on top?

The custom is traced to 1 Corinthians 11.

UK No Smoking Day began on the first day of Lent in 1984 but was later fixed on which day?

Ireland kept the Ash Wednesday date.

In Lutheran, Anglican and Methodist calendars, Lent runs from Ash Wednesday to which day?

That makes 46 calendar days, or 40 once the Sundays are left out of the count.

For dating Easter, and so Ash Wednesday, the spring equinox is always fixed on which day?

Easter falls on the Sunday after the first full moon on or after that date, and Ash Wednesday is 46 days earlier.

Which prophet urged, 'O daughter of my people, gird on sackcloth, roll in the ashes'?

Daniel likewise recounts pleading with God 'with fasting, sackcloth, and ashes'.

Jesus said which two cities would have repented in sackcloth and ashes had they seen his mighty works?

The saying appears in both Matthew 11:21 and Luke 10:13.

Which biblical woman put ashes on her head and tore her robe after her half-brother assaulted her?

The gesture in 2 Samuel 13:19 expresses grief; elsewhere ashes signal sorrow for sin and the old self returning to dust.

In which English city have Anglicans and Catholics jointly offered 'Ashes to Go'?

Father Marc Lyden-Smith of Saint Mary's Church called the shared effort 'a tremendous witness in our city'.

In Orthodox Great Lent, Clean Monday is followed two days later by which sorrowfully named day?

Only a small number of Western Rite Orthodox, such as those in the Antiochian Western Rite Vicariate, keep Ash Wednesday itself.

The Miserere and pardon prayers in the traditional Anglican service came from which medieval English use?

The service, titled A Commination, kept the lesser Litany, Lord's Prayer and three prayers for pardon from that English use.

Ash Wednesday last fell on its earliest possible date, 4 February, in 1818. When will it next do so?

That date requires a common year with Easter on 22 March, as also happened in 1598, 1693 and 1761.