| 26 Wednesday | |
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| violet | Ash Wednesday | |
| | Mass of Ash Wednesday; after the sign of the cross and greeting, the penitential act is omitted.
Preface of Lent III or IV. |
| | [219] Joel 2: 12-18; Ps 51:3-4, 5-6, 12-13, 14+17; 2 Cor 5:20-6:2; Matt 6:1-6, 16-18 |
| | (Switch to Vol. II of the Lit. of the Hours.)
Hours of Ash Wednesday; Psalter Week 4 today and until Saturday.
Today at Morning Prayer, the psalms of Friday, Week 3 may be used. |
| | The celebrant blesses and distributes ashes after the homily.
Other persons may be associated with the bishop or priest in the imposition of ashes, e.g., deacons, special ministers of communion and other lay persons, when there is true pastoral need. |
| Special ministers of communion and deacons may bring blessed ashes to the sick and those confined to their homes. If a minister is not available, a member of the family or another person may bring the blessed ashes to a shut-in, using one of the formulas in the Roman Missal to impose ashes. |
| For pastoral reasons the blessing and distribution of ashes may take place outside Mass. In this case, the entire liturgy of the word should be celebrated: entrance song, opening prayer, readings and chants, homily, blessing and distribution of ashes, and general intercessions. See the Book of Blessings, nos. 1656ff. |
| | Archdioceses of Cape Town, Durban and Johannesburg, South Africa [SACBC] | | white | St Alexander of Alexandria, Bishop | Optional | | Common of Pastors |
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| Anniversary: | 86th anniversary of the death of P. Philip Hobart (67) d. 1945 at Sheffield, England.  |
| Anniversary: | 29th anniversary of the death of P. Felix Kalebwe (65) d. 2002 at Lusaka, Zambia. |
On this day in our Jesuit history...
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| 1611 | At Ferrara died Father Anthony Possevino, employed by Gregory XIII on many important embassies to Sweden, Russia, Poland and Germany. Colleges and seminaries were opened by him at Cracow, Olmutz, Prague, Braunsberg, and Vilna. With all his labors he found time to write 24 books on history, sculpture and science. |
| 1878 | At Rome died Father Angelo Secchi, one of the leading modern astronomers. He is honored with a bust in the Concellaria and on the Pincio. He taught physics at Georgetown and made the first general spectral classification of the stars at the Vatican Observatory. Inventor of the Secchi disk, to measure water transparency. |
| 1932 | Hartman Grisar dies at Innsbruck. He was a Reformation historian and a Lutheran scholar. |
| 1984 | James Finnegan, S.J. New York Province, is killed in Beirut, Lebanon by stray shell fire. |
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