Ash Wednesday: Be kind, be welcoming, or at least be silent.

Okay, I understand that, God willing, churches and chapels will be mobbed on tomorrow with folks wanting—and we don't know their reasons—to receive the ashes that will, or should, remind them of their imminent mortality. Yes, I understand that, even above Easter in may churches, this is the most crowded church day of the year. Yes, I do understand that, aside from maybe Palm Sunday, Easter, and Christmas, that many of these people wouldn't recognize what a church looks like if it were the mirror they look into daily. But I'm asking you, begging you: be a Catholic. If just one of those folks looking for a dirty forehead leaves contemplating a genuine return to the Church...would that not be a glorious thing?

You can pray for that!

May God continue to bless you.