LENTEN SEASON INSPIRES CATHOLIC CHURCH'S APOLOGY.Byline: Staff and Wire Services Today is Ash Wednesday Ash Wednesday, in the Western Church, the first day of Lent, being the seventh Wednesday before Easter. On this day ashes are placed on the foreheads of the faithful to remind them of death, of the sorrow they should feel for their sins, and of the necessity of , the first day of the 40 days of Lent that lead up to Easter Sunday. For Christians, it's a time of prayer, discipline and penitence Penitence Act of Contrition prayer of atonement said after making one’s confession. [Christianity: Misc.] Agnes, Sister former Lady Laurentini; a penitent nun. [Br. Lit. that culminates with the celebration of Christ's resurrection and a sense of spiritual renewal. This Lenten season is a special one for the Catholic Church, a Jubilee year Jubilee year fiftieth year; liberty proclaimed for all inhabitants. [O.T.: Leviticus 25:8–13] See : Freedom in which Pope John Paul II Pope John Paul II (Latin: Ioannes Paulus PP. II, Italian: Giovanni Paolo II, Polish: Jan Paweł II) born Karol Józef Wojtyła has asked Catholics to take stock of the sins committed by the Catholic Church through history. In an apostolic letter, John Paul The name John Paul might refer to: Full name
Cardinal Roger Mahony His Eminence Roger Michael Cardinal Mahony (born February 27, 1936) is an American prelate of the Roman Catholic Church. He currently serves as the fourth Archbishop of Los Angeles, and was elevated to the cardinalate in 1991. , in a Lenten message released Tuesday, offered apologies to anyone offended by him and the Archdiocese of Los Angeles, which, at 4 million Roman Catholics across Southern California, is the nation's largest. He singled out homosexuals and women in the Catholic Church, Jews, Muslims and victims of clergy sexual abuse for apologies. Mahony apologized ``to everyone in the Archdiocese whom I have offended in my pastoral ministry by a lack of patience and understanding, through my pride and lack of charity and by my rush to judge others without adequately hearing other points of view.'' The Jubilee, which occurs every 50th year, is a Jewish tradition, mentioned in the book of Leviticus, a period that is a special opportunity for grace. It is a time for rest, for fair dealings with neighbors and business associates and for celebration. Many Christian denominations observe Ash Wednesday with a ceremony in which a priest or pastor uses ashes burned during the previous year's Palm Sunday (the Sunday before Easter) to mark a cross on the foreheads of worshippers. This blessing is based on the passage from Genesis: ``. . . for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt shalt aux.v. Archaic A second person singular present tense of shall. thou return.'' The 40 days of Lent symbolize the 40 days that the Bible says Jesus spent in the desert before beginning his public ministry. It's a powerful number throughout the Old and New Testaments, considered to be an ideal time needed to prepare for something. ``But whether it's 40 or 39 or 41 is not the issue,'' said the Rev. James Manning of St. Albert the Great Church in Kettering, Ohio. ``The point is to prepare for the new life of Easter.'' |
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