Friends at Court.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXIX, Issue 7, 14 February 1901, Page 7

Friends at Court.

GLEANINGS FOR NEXT WEEK'S CALENDAR. (Written for the N.Z. Tablet.) February 1 7, Sunday.— Quinquagesima Sunday. „ IS, Monday.— St. Raymund de Pennaforfc, Confessor, „ lit, Tuesday.— St. Titus, Bishop and Confessor. „ iv, Wednesday . — Ann Wednesday. „ 21 , Thursday.— St. Paul, the first Hermit. „ 22, Friday. — Feast of the Drown ot Thorns. „ 23, Saturday.— St. Peter Damian, Bishop, Confessor, and Doctor of the Church. ASH WEDNESDAY. Ash Wednesday is the first day of Lent, so called from the Catholic ceremony of blessing ashes and strewing it upon the foreheads of the clergy and laity as a sign of penance. The Fathers of the Church, especially St. Gregory, call the first day of Lent the 'head of the fast,' raput jejuntt, because it is on this day that the fast of Lent begins. This custom is very ancient, for we know it was observed in the time of Pope Gregory the Great (590-604) The covering: of the head with ashes has long been a common sign, of mourning among Eastern nations, indicative of the deepest sorrow and distress. Instances of this are mentioned in Scripture. Jeremiaß advises the people of Jerusalem to cover themselves witn ashes to escape the wrath of Nabuchodonosor (Jer xxv. 34) The Ninivites dressed in sackcloth and put ashes upon their heads to avert the heavenly vengeance (Jonas iii. 6). The Christian Church has adopted a symbol so potent to excite in the soul sentiments of humility, compunction, and penance, by reminding us that we are but dust and unto dust shall return. Penitents, in the early Christian Church, testified their sorrow and humiliation at times by standing at the door of the Church in ' sackcloth and ashes.' The ashes are blessed at the altar, immediately before Mass ; the celebrant marks on the heads of the clergy and the assembled people, with the blessed ashes, and to each person he thus marks he addresses the words which God announced to the first sinner: ' Remember, 0 man ! that thou art dust and that thou shalt return unto dust ' (Gen. iii. 19). The ashes that are used on Ash Wednesday should be dry ; this the Sacred Congregation of Rites specifies (May 23, 1693, apud Gardellini, vol. 1., p. 19). They should be made from the branches blessed on Palm Sunday, the year previous. The Rubric of the Missal is formal on this point. These ashes are indeed the remains of the glory of the God-Man, and as the seed of that which is reserved for us in heaven. Hence we should receive them in accordance with the sentiments of the Church. LENT. Anciently in the Latin Church, Lent lasted only 36 days, and commenced only on the Sunday of the sixth week before Easter, which they called Quadragesima Sunday. In the eleventh century, to more closely imitate the fast of 40 days which Jesus Christ suffered in the desert, some added four days before Quadragesima Sunday, and thia custom was followed in the West ; for. by deducting the six Sundays which arc no fast days, there remain exactly 40 days of faat, in imitation of our Saviuor. From this rule we have to except the Church of Milan, which commences Lent only on Quadragesima Sunday. The ancient Latin monks kept three Lents : the great Lent before Baeter, the other before Christmas, which they called the Fast of St. Martin, and the other the Fast of St. John the Baptist after Pentecost, all three of to days. The Greeks observed four others besides that of Easter, namely : that of the Apostles, of the Assumption, of Christmas, and of the Tranpfiguration ; but they reduced them to seven days each. The Jacobites have a fifth fa6t, which they call the Fast of the Penance of Ninive. The Chaldaics and Nestorians do the same. The Maronites have six, by adding that of the Exaltation of the Cross. The 40 days' period, as commemorative of our Lord's 40 days' fast, or of the similar perfunctory fasts of Moses and Elias, commences with Ash Wednesday, between which day and Easter Sunday (omitting the Sundays, on which the fast is not observed), 40 clear days intervene. The rigor of the ancient observauce, which excluded all flesh and even the so-called ' white meats,' is now much relaxed ; but the principle of permitting but one meal, with a slight refection or collation, is widely retained. The precept of fast obliges all those who have their twenty-first year oompleted/if no other cause dispenses them from fast. In Spain, during the Crusades and the wars with the Moors, a practice arose of permitting in certain cases, the substitution of a contribution to the holy war, for the observance of Lenten abstinence ; and although the object has long since ceased, the composition is still permitted, under the same title of the 1 Crusada.'