lucky4west:
nice epistle, and very educative, for people who celebrates Ash Wednesday i do not have a problem with that, i'm a Pentecostal we do not celebrate it ...however i would love to add that having a godly sorrow for sin r genuine repentance goes beyond an outward sign of carrying ash on the forehead...if your heart and attitude towards God and man is not reformed as an evident of a re-birth( being born again) and daily following in that routine then the outward sign is a waste, true worshipers will worship in spirit and truth..your spirit knowing what is right to do and truth-God's word...i think one of the reasons some Pentecostal Christians tend to often criticize orthodox christian notably Catholics is their emphasis on physical signs and activities without an inward/inner re-generation ...we learn every day and there is no need to antagonize one another

this is just incorrect.


catholics do not emphasize physical signs without an inward regeneration.

funny enough, the reading at mass in ash wednesday is usually from the book of Joel where it says rend your hearts not your garment and turn to the Lord, even the gospel passage will usually be Jesus saying when u fast do not put on a glomy look like the pharisees who like to show off outward signs without the inward reality. in fact the preaching that day will be centered on interior repentance, metanoia. so for you to claim that the catholic church emphasizes outward signs without a similar emphasis on the inward regeneration is totally wrong and probably shows you haven't really been to a catholic church to be informed on their attitude to outward signs.

We do

mine85:
But most anglican churches don't put ash on our fore head again.. Why

I am SE Anglican and experienced ashes growing up. I also attended those dreadful bare services for good Friday and wept all the time.

It was so heart wrenching.

Wolgrace:
I have a question.

Anglican churches in the south eastern part of Nigeria don't practice it. They claim they came out of Roman catholic and any body from catholic joining them must denounce their pagan worship and doctrines.

How come the south western anglicans still practice these pagan doctrine of the Roman catholic? I need answer on this.

Y'all should quit trying to paint ancient pagan practices with bible. You Christians are all children of ROME and as such follow her in her pagan practices. Like Christmas, Easter, valentine, Thanksgiving, mother's day etc. All pagan holidays dedicated to various deities.

Ash Wednesday begins the 40 day lent. An ancient practice instituted by Semiramis, the mother of Nimrod the sun god, who was also his wife. Semiramis became known as Ishtar, pronounced Easter.

She mourned the death of her son Tammuz who was eaten by pigs for 40days. In mourning for Tammuz, the people were to eat no meat for 40 days.

donnie:
Y'all should quit trying to paint ancient pagan practices with bible. You Christians are all children of ROME and as such follow her in her pagan practices. Like Christmas, Easter, valentine, Thanksgiving, mother's day etc. All pagan holidays dedicated to various deities.

Ash Wednesday begins the 40 day lent. An ancient practice instituted by Semiramis, the mother of Nimrod the sun god, who was also his wife. Semiramis became known as Ishtar, pronounced Easter.

She mourned the death of her son Tammuz who was eaten by pigs for 40days. In mourning for Tammuz, the people were to eat no meat for 40 days.

somehow in your desire to be quick to criticism and slow to thinking you just forgot that the bible is full of 40 days fasting right from the testament down to Jesus.

Please use you thinking faculty before you criticise

Ubenedictus:
somehow in your desire to be quick to criticism and slow to thinking you just forgot that the bible is full of 40 days fasting right from the testament down to Jesus.

Please use you thinking faculty before you criticise

Will you shut up... You idolater.
It's full of forty days, and so?
Where in the Bible were you told to celebrate Easter?

donnie:


Will you shut up... You idolater.
It's full of forty days, and so?
Where in the Bible were you told to celebrate Easter?

Christ our passover lamb has been sacrificed, Let us celebrate the festival...,
Is that passage not in your bible or your pastor didnt remember to show it to you?

donnie:
Y'all should quit trying to paint ancient pagan practices with bible. You Christians are all children of ROME and as such follow her in her pagan practices. Like Christmas, Easter, valentine, Thanksgiving, mother's day etc. All pagan holidays dedicated to various deities.

Thanksgiving and Mother's Day aren't even religious holidays, how did the Roman Catholic Church come up with them? Heck, Mother's Day was made by an American woman (Anna Jarvis) in the early 20th century and she wasn't even Catholic.

This reminds me of when I saw someone try to claim that the American Fourth of July holiday was based on some ancient pagan holiday.

Ash Wednesday begins the 40 day lent. An ancient practice instituted by Semiramis, the mother of Nimrod the sun god, who was also his wife. Semiramis became known as Ishtar, pronounced Easter.

She mourned the death of her son Tammuz who was eaten by pigs for 40days. In mourning for Tammuz, the people were to eat no meat for 40 days.

Ishtar is not pronounced Easter, as any dictionary's provided pronunciation will demonstrate. Even if it was, "Easter" was originally written in English as Estre (see the Oxford English Dictionary's early examples of it) which sounds quite different; it only became written and pronounced as Easter much later, so any similarity would be coincidence. Not to mention that English is, I believe, the only language where the word for Easter bears even a passing resemblance to Ishtar. In French, the word is Pâques. In Portuguese, it's Páscoa. In Swahili it's "Pasaka ya Kikristo". Most languages take their name for the holiday from pascha, the original Greek term. German comes closest, with the name being Ostern, but that's still rather different from Ishtar. English's usage of Easter for the holiday is an anomaly among languages.

As for your claims that there was a 40-day period of eating no meat for Tammuz, could you provide any proof of this? Claims like this are common on the Internet, but they are never backed up by any proof. No one points to any ancient document that records this custom. As far as I can tell, they're just made up and spread around by people who don't check to see if it's true or not.