Roman Catholics in Ukraine celebrate Ash Wednesday

The Western Church observes a 6-week Lent as Saturdays are also considered fast days. In order to make it 40 days, the Western Church in the seventh century added four days in the beginning of the fast. Therefore, it starts on Ash Wednesday. According to the tradition, which was formed in the Latin Church in the eighth century, it was called Ash Wednesday after an ancient rite of putting ash on one's head as a sign of repentance. The ash used is the ash of burnt palm branches left from the previous year's feast of the Entrance of the Lord into Jerusalem. The ash is consecrated and the priest puts it on the foreheads of the parishioners in the form of the cross.

The Catholic Church requires observation of strict fast only on Ash Wednesday, Good Friday and Holy Saturday. On the other days of the fast, it is prohibited to eat meat, but dairy products and eggs are allowed. The fasts became less strict in the Catholic Church after the Second Vatican Council (1962-65), for a fast for Christians is a time of renewing the spirit in prayer and practicing Christian virtues.

Weddings and other celebratory events are not held during Lent.

In this year's Lent address, the pope reminds that Lent leads us to the celebration of Easter, the death and Resurrection of Christ, of which we also are participants as we received a new life in Christ in baptism. The fact that in most cases baptism is received in childhood indicates that it is about a gift of God: no one deserves eternal life by their own efforts. God's mercy, which cancels sin and allows to have in our life "the mind which was also in Christ Jesus" (Phil. 2:5), is granted to one freely, only by God's grace. Baptism is the meeting with Christ, who forms the whole being of the baptized person, gives them God's life and calls to sincere repentance.

As he mentioned Bible readings for the Sundays of Lent, Pope Benedict XVI pointed out that through these texts of the Holy Scripture, the church leads us to an intensive meeting with the Lord and calls for the renewal and deepening of the stages of the Christian initiation.

The pope stressed that "emersion in Christ's death and resurrection through the Holy Sacrament of Baptism every day compels us to free our heart from the burden of material things, from selfish attachment to 'earthly things' that lead us to impoverishment and prevents us from being ready and open to God and our neighbors. Lent teaches us through the traditional practice of fasting, charity and prayer to live by Christ's love in an increasingly radical way.

The pope stressed that Lent is the time to be likened to Jesus and go through deep repentance – that is to be governed in life by God's will, free oneself from selfishness, from coveting and love for money, to overcome the instinct to rule over others and to open up to Christ's love. Practice of charity is a call to give priority to God and to concentrate on one's neighbor in order to rediscover the good God and accept His mercy.

Pope Benedict XVI also called everyone to prayer, which opens prospects of eternity and transcendence in which we find time for God to learn His words, to open ours hearts to hope, which leads to eternal life.