How to let ashes wear off

[Anonymous]

I got ashes at noon, for Ash Wednesday. It always feels a bit showy to me. Do you just let them wear off?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I got ashes at noon, for Ash Wednesday. It always feels a bit showy to me. Do you just let them wear off?

Until you shower. They are not showy.

[Anonymous]

Showy? I’m not so sure. It’s a sign of your religion.

I wear mine until I shower at night. There are plenty of people with them on.

Some religions have specific clothing they wear daily, ie burka, so I think ashes are really a small display.

[Anonymous]

DP and I’m the poster who years ago got blisteringly reamed out for wearing ashes to a job interview. FWIW

[Anonymous]

I’ve always removed them immediately. It was drilled into my head as a kid not to be showy with religious observances.

[Anonymous]

Wash them off unless you're doing something where your religion is relevant.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:DP and I’m the poster who years ago got blisteringly reamed out for wearing ashes to a job interview. FWIW

Ha! I remember that thread. I wasn’t one of the reamers, I promise . Did you get the job? Also, I clearly spend too much time on here.

[Anonymous]

I feel like it’s showy too, OP, and ironic bc the gospel on Ash Wednesday talks about fasting without letting others know. Seems incongruent.

I do typically keep mine on but it’s totally fine to wipe them off.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I feel like it’s showy too, OP, and ironic bc the gospel on Ash Wednesday talks about fasting without letting others know. Seems incongruent.

I do typically keep mine on but it’s totally fine to wipe them off.

This this this. I was just commenting on this in the office.

[Anonymous]

I grew up in a blue collar town where very few people did NOT go to church, and probably 75% was Catholic (we were Lutheran) and I swear I never heard of this thing with the ashes until the mid-80s (I was out of school by then but visiting in the same region) I saw people with these smudges on their foreheads and was perplexed and had to be told what this was about. Has this always been a tradition? (Maybe we had longish easter breaks and I just didn't see the Catholic kids with their ashes? Although I sense that other denominations have picked up the practice?)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I grew up in a blue collar town where very few people did NOT go to church, and probably 75% was Catholic (we were Lutheran) and I swear I never heard of this thing with the ashes until the mid-80s (I was out of school by then but visiting in the same region) I saw people with these smudges on their foreheads and was perplexed and had to be told what this was about. Has this always been a tradition? (Maybe we had longish easter breaks and I just didn't see the Catholic kids with their ashes? Although I sense that other denominations have picked up the practice?)

They probably went to services at the end of their workday, so as a kid you wouldn’t have been out in the evenings to see them. It’s a very long-standing tradition.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Showy? I’m not so sure. It’s a sign of your religion.

I wear mine until I shower at night. There are plenty of people with them on.

Some religions have specific clothing they wear daily, ie burka, so I think ashes are really a small display.

This. It only strikes people as "showy" because it isn't usual for them to display an outward sign of their religion. It's no showier than wearing a crucifix necklace and plenty of people do that. It's just that you're used to it.

As PP said, anyone who wears religious garb daily -- burka, hijab, kippah, payos, whatever -- is not going to find ashes "showy."

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DP and I’m the poster who years ago got blisteringly reamed out for wearing ashes to a job interview. FWIW

Ha! I remember that thread. I wasn’t one of the reamers, I promise . Did you get the job? Also, I clearly spend too much time on here.

I wouldn’t have yelled at you but it does strike me as odd. For example, why couldn’t you get the ashes AFTER the job interview?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I grew up in a blue collar town where very few people did NOT go to church, and probably 75% was Catholic (we were Lutheran) and I swear I never heard of this thing with the ashes until the mid-80s (I was out of school by then but visiting in the same region) I saw people with these smudges on their foreheads and was perplexed and had to be told what this was about. Has this always been a tradition? (Maybe we had longish easter breaks and I just didn't see the Catholic kids with their ashes? Although I sense that other denominations have picked up the practice?)

Same, though I never saw this until college in the late 90s. I'm Methodist, attended regularly growing up, and had no idea that Ash Wednesday wasn't just a Catholic observance until a few years ago. Our DCUM-local Methodist church administers ashes at the Metro and has two services. I looked up my hometown church and they appear to have one service, in the evening.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DP and I’m the poster who years ago got blisteringly reamed out for wearing ashes to a job interview. FWIW

Ha! I remember that thread. I wasn’t one of the reamers, I promise . Did you get the job? Also, I clearly spend too much time on here.

I wouldn’t have yelled at you but it does strike me as odd. For example, why couldn’t you get the ashes AFTER the job interview?

I'm not the PP, but it's not like ashes are something you just go in and get. There needs to be a church service, and most churches have a couple to choose between, or maybe 3. So, if the only time that works for you is before some event, you go before the event.