Ash Wednesday is a solemn focusing on sin, repentance, and our need for forgiveness. Most tend to underplay sin nowadays (and, yes, that’s in reaction to its over-stressing in the past), but Ash Wednesday is a reminder of its dreadful reality.
Today is 2.2.22 - even for people in USA, who write dates in the oddest way! It is Candlemas, the Feast of the Presentation of Jesus in the Temple, 40 days after Christmas.
Pour forth, we beseech you, O God, your grace into our hearts, that we, to whom the incarnation of Christ your Son was made known by the message of an angel, may, by his passion and cross, be brought to the glory of his resurrection, through Jesus Christ, our Saviour, who is alive with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.
Incline your ear, O God, to our pleading, and by the grace of your coming to us enlighten the darkness of our hearts, through Jesus Christ, our Saviour, who is alive with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.