You tell what its about I know it has something to do with Christians but what exactly is Ash Wednesdays purpose?
2007-02-23 07:29:17 · 6 answers · asked by Anonymous in Society & Culture ➔ Religion & Spirituality
Ash Wednesday is the first day of Lent. It is celebrated by Liturgical churches (Catholic, Lutheran, Anglican, United Methodist, Presbyterian USA, and United Church of Christ). It is 40 days, but it doesn't include Sundays because those are celebration days. Sunday is a day of feasting, while Lent is a time of fasting. It prepares someone for the season of Easter. Lent is a time of repentance, fasting and preparation for the coming of Easter. It is a time of self-examination and reflection. In the early church, Lent was a time to prepare new converts for baptism. Today, Christians focus on their relationship with God, often choosing to give up something or volunteering and giving of themselves for others. The forty days represents the time Jesus spent in the wilderness, enduring the temptation of Satan.
The ashes are given to each person in the sign of the cross on their forhead. They are a two fold reminder. We are human. We are mortal. From dust we came and dust we shall return. Also, ashes were used in the bible as a symbol that someone was in deep sorrow over their own sins. It is an outward symbol of an inward repentance of sins.
The last week of Lent is Holy Week. It starts with Palm Sunday (the day when we remember Christ coming back into Jerusalem where people laid palms on the road). Thursday is Maundy Thursday. Maundy comes from the Latin word that means Commandment because during the John scripture of the Last Supper Christ gave his disciples a new commandment (to love one another). Maundy Thursday is the day of the Last Supper. Good Friday is the day we remember the death of Christ. Easter Sunday ends Lent.
2007-02-23 07:37:09 · answer #1 · answered by One Odd Duck 6 · 1⤊ 0⤋
Ash Wednesday is the beginning of Lent for Western Christian churches. It's a day of penitence to clean the soul before the Lent fast.
Roman Catholic, Anglican, and some other churches hold special services at which worshippers are marked with ashes as a symbol of death, and sorrow for sin.
In Ash Wednesday services churchgoers are marked on the forehead with a cross of ashes as a sign of penitence and mortality.
The use of ashes, made by burning palm crosses from the previous Palm Sunday, is very symbolic.
God our Father, you create us from the dust of the earth.
Grant that these ashes may be for us a sign of our penitence, and a symbol of our mortality.
The shape of the mark and the words used are symbolic in other ways:
The cross is a reminder of the mark of the cross made at baptism
The ashes used on Ash Wednesday are made by burning the palm crosses that were blessed on the previous Palm Sunday.
May God bless you
2007-02-23 15:36:19 · answer #2 · answered by ? 6 · 1⤊ 0⤋
Ash Wednesday liturgies are some of the best attended in the entire year.
Ashes are an ancient symbol of repentance (sackcloth and ashes). They also remind us of our mortality ("remember that you are dust") and thus of the day when we will stand before God and be judged. This can be linked easily to the death and resurrection motif of Baptism. To prepare well for the day we die, we must die now to sin and rise to new life in Christ. Being marked with ashes at the beginning of Lent indicates our recognition of the need for deeper conversion of our lives during this season of renewal.
2007-02-25 15:04:09 · answer #3 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
The seventh Wednesday before Easter and the first day of Lent, on which many Christians receive a mark of ashes on the forehead as a token of penitence and mortality
http://education.yahoo.com/reference/dictionary/entry/Ash%20Wednesday
History of Ash Wed.
http://www.orlutheran.com/html/ash.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ash_Wednesday
Hope these help. I'm horrible at explaining it.
2007-02-23 15:34:39 · answer #4 · answered by sister steph 6 · 0⤊ 0⤋
it's a day that prepares a person to accept the Mark Of The Beast. They put a Cross in your forehead and in your Right hand, like the word says. Consider when U read the bible that this mark is never in your left hand nor on any other part of your body, and the cross is a Roman Catholic Death Symbol that symbolizes DEATH and not the LORD. Read your history book and bible. No OFFENSE TO CATHOLICS
2007-02-23 15:55:01 · answer #5 · answered by poetified2 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Sorry, I don't know. They put ashes on there heads and carry palm leaves I think.
2007-02-23 15:34:30 · answer #6 · answered by rezany 5 · 0⤊ 0⤋