Congregants received ashes during the midday Ash Wednesday Mass Feb. 18 at the Cathedral of the Assumption, which was close to full. (Record Photo by Marnie McAllister) 
Congregants received ashes during the midday Ash Wednesday Mass Feb. 18 at the Cathedral of the Assumption, which was close to full. (Record Photo by Marnie McAllister) 
Congregants received ashes during the midday Ash Wednesday Mass Feb. 18 at the Cathedral of the Assumption, which was close to full. (Record Photo by Marnie McAllister) 
Congregants received ashes during the midday Ash Wednesday Mass Feb. 18 at the Cathedral of the Assumption, which was close to full. (Record Photo by Marnie McAllister) 
Congregants received ashes during the midday Ash Wednesday Mass Feb. 18 at the Cathedral of the Assumption, which was close to full. (Record Photo by Marnie McAllister) 
Archbishop Shelton J. Fabre, second from left, and Father Fred Klotter distributed ashes during a midday Mass of Feb. 18, Ash Wednesday, at the Cathedral of the Assumption in downtown Louisville. They were joined by lay people who helped distribute ashes in the nearly full church. (Record Photo by Marnie McAllister)
By Courtney Mares and Marnie McAllister
OSV News and The Record
ROME — On Ash Wednesday, Pope Leo XIV encouraged Catholics to ask the Lord for “the gift of true conversion” at the start of the 40-day penitential season of Lent.
Speaking to English-speaking pilgrims at his Wednesday general audience in St. Peter’s Square Feb. 18, the pope encouraged people to approach Lent as a time of “conversion of heart” so that “we may better respond to his love for us and share that love with those around us.”
In a similar vein, Archbishop Shelton J. Fabre, who celebrated a midday Mass on Ash Wednesday at the Cathedral of the Assumption, told the nearly full church that “Lent places before us a question: ‘How well do I serve as an ambassador for Christ?’ ”
Ashes, the archbishop said, are “a sign of our desire to transform our hearts so that we might be better ambassadors of Christ.”
Thanking the congregation for its presence, he said, “I do believe each and every one of us honestly knows in our minds and in our hearts what we desire to transform in our lives, the sin that we might turn away from during the season of Lent so that we might serve as a better ambassador for Christ.”
Back in Rome, Pope Leo asked Catholics to turn to prayer as Lent begins.
“At the beginning of Lent, I urge you to live this liturgical season with an intense spirit of prayer so that you may arrive, inwardly renewed, at the celebration of the great mystery of Christ’s Resurrection, the supreme revelation of God’s merciful love.”
Before the audience, the pope greeted pilgrims from the popemobile, frequently stopping to bless babies as he made his way through the square.
Continuing his weekly catechesis on the documents of the Second Vatican Council, Pope Leo offered a reflection on “Lumen Gentium,” the Dogmatic Constitution on the Church, which he explained “presents the Church as both a sign and an instrument of this plan of salvation.”
He said the Church is a sign “because the Church community makes the unity established by Christ through his Cross and Resurrection visible to the world today” and an instrument as “It is through the Church that God achieves the aim of bringing people to him and uniting them with one another.”
“As we journey through a world still marked by division, let us ask the Lord to continue to guide his Church in the mission of sanctification and reconciliation,” he said.
In his message for Lent this year, Pope Leo encouraged the faithful to embrace the “ancient ascetic practice” of fasting, as well as “refraining from words that offend and hurt our neighbor.”
Lent is a liturgical season of penance stretching from Ash Wednesday to Holy Thursday, during which Christians are encouraged to undertake voluntary acts of self-denial such as fasting and almsgiving, along with charitable and missionary works.
On Wednesday afternoon, Pope Leo led a solemn procession on Rome’s Aventine Hill from the Benedictine Basilica of Sant’Anselmo to the Dominican Basilica of Santa Sabina, retracing a papal procession route that dates back centuries.
The procession culminated with the pope offering Ash Wednesday Mass at Santa Sabina, one of the oldest surviving Christian basilicas in Rome, built in 422 A.D.
