Ash Wednesday 2025


Imagine waking up one morning to find that everything you’ve built—your home, your livelihood, even the land you’ve cultivated—has been reduced to ashes.
Decades of careful planting, harvesting, and nurturing the soil—gone in an instant.
But in the face of such loss, these farmers didn’t give up. Instead, they resolved to rebuild and replant, saying, “We will grow again, even more than ever before.”
What a powerful image for us as we begin this season of Lent! Today, we receive ashes as a reminder of our mortality—“Remember, you are dust, and to dust you shall return.”
But just like those farmers, we are not meant to stay in the ashes. Lent is our opportunity to rebuild, to return to God, and to grow in faith even more than ever before.
And that is precisely why, in our parishes, we are embracing the Jubilee Year of Hope as our Lenten theme: Pilgrims of Hope. Lent is a pilgrimage—a journey of turning away from sin and walking toward the hope that Christ offers.
Just as those farmers did not despair in the face of destruction, we are called to trust in God’s power to bring new life from the ashes of our struggles.
In today’s Gospel, Jesus warns against empty, showy religious acts. He calls us to a deeper, more authentic faith—practicing prayer, fasting, and almsgiving not for attention, but to genuinely reorient our hearts toward God.
The Altadena farmers didn’t set out to be recognized for their resilience; they simply committed to restoring what was lost.
Similarly, Lent calls us not to perform our faith for others, but to quietly and sincerely nurture our relationship with God.
So, as we begin this Lenten pilgrimage, let’s not just see these ashes as a symbol of mortality, but as a sign of hope—hope that God can bring new life from the dust.
This season, let’s take up the challenge to pray, fast, and give—not for show, but for transformation.
And when Easter morning comes, may we find that our hearts have been renewed, our faith has been deepened, and we are ready to rise with Christ, Pilgrims of Hope in a world that longs for new life.


Location: Morrisonville, NY, USA

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