Washington Auxiliary Bishop Evelio Menjivar celebrated a Feb. 18 Ash Wednesday Mass for students at Don Bosco Cristo Rey High School in Takoma Park and urged them to “remember you are ambassadors for Christ.”
“Ambassadors represent something like a country, but you represent Christ and His Church,” Bishop Menjivar told the students. “Carry on the message of compassion, joy and hope Jesus wants you to share with others.”
About 300 students attended the liturgy, and some served as lectors and altar servers during the Mass, which was offered at Our Lady of Sorrows Church, which is next door to the school.
Don Bosco Cristo Rey High School is a coeducational school that is jointly sponsored by the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Washington and the Salesians of Don Bosco. It is part of the national Cristo Rey Network of 41 schools, and it offers a rigorous college preparatory curriculum and Corporate Work Study Program for minority students from families with limited economic means.
Noting the outward sign of ashes on the forehead, Bishop Menjivar joked that “today is when we can truly tell who has gone to Mass.”
The ashes, made by burning the palm fronds from the previous year’s Palm Sunday, are given along with the admonition to “Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return,” or “Repent, and believe in the Gospel.”
Bishop Menjivar told the students that while they are “marked with a visible cross of ashes,” they carry it as a sign “to show our humble admission that we are sinners and in need of conversion.”
The ashes on the forehead, he added, also signify “our disposition to renew His (God’s) presence in our lives.” He also reminded the students that while the ashes may fade or be washed away, “the grace of this moment – our good intentions – must not fade from our hearts.”
Lent is traditionally marked by almsgiving, fasting and prayer. Bishop Menjivar suggested that those traditional practices be joined by listening, turning away from or limiting time spent on social media and other good works.
By listening, the bishop said, the faithful will “make room for God’s voice in our lives … (and) hearing, listening to the cries of those in need.”
Bishop Menjivar told students to “put the phone away and just listen” or to use their smart phones to access apps that help them pray. “Smart phone apps that do not help us pray are not smart,” he quipped.
He said students should use social media platforms “to evangelize and promote justice, kindness and hope.”
Fasting from food during Lent in the hopes of losing weight, the bishop said, “is a diet, not an act of penance.” He suggested that students fast from harmful words, harsh language and gossip and to “speak kindly and respectfully and speak words of encouragement.”
Bishop Menjivar also encouraged the students to “take the journey of conversion together.”
“Lent is not a personal journey, but communal,” he said, adding that helping others, donating to Catholic Relief Services, and giving to local food drives are “good actions to do during Lent.”
During this penitential season, Catholic Relief Services conducts its annual Rice Bowl program. Catholic Relief Services (CRS) is the U.S. bishops’ overseas humanitarian outreach.
The CRS Lenten program features a cardboard “rice bowl” that participants fill with coins during the Lenten season. The collected money is then presented to CRS. Seventy-five percent of the funds are used to support CRS programs around the world. The other 25 percent is returned to the diocese or archdiocese in which it was collected to be used for hunger and poverty alleviation programs on the local level. (Find more information at https://support.crs.org/)
At the end of the Mass, Salesian Father Louis Molinelli, who serves as the director of mission for Don Bosco Cristo Rey High School and teaches at the school, asked the students to reflect on Bishop Menjivar’s words “with compassion.”
“We need to be a little more reflective in our lives and ask, ‘who is God calling me to be,’” Father Molinelli said.
Ash Wednesday begins the season of Lent, the 40-day penitential period in preparation for Easter. Lent continues until the Friday of the Passion of the Lord (Good Friday), which this year will be observed on April 3. Easter this year will be celebrated on Sunday, April 5.
All Fridays of Lent are days of total abstinence from meat, a law that binds all Catholics age 14 and older. Good Friday is not only a day of total abstinence from meat, but also a day of fasting – that is, people are limited to one single full meal on that day. The law of fasting binds all Catholics from their 18th year until up to and including their 59th birthday. All Fridays of Lent are days of total abstinence from meat, a law that binds all Catholics age 14 and older.
Also during this time, many parishes offer Stations of the Cross, penance services and increased opportunities for Confession and other events to help the faithful spiritually prepare to celebrate the resurrection of Jesus.
Before the students departed the Mass in silence, Bishop Menjivar urged them to go out into the world “not only with the cross of ashes on our foreheads, but with compassionate hearts and a fortified spirit to listen to the Word of God.”
