Again we see Jesus having mercy on human misery. This time the person experiencing the result of his healing is a paralytic. Jesus takes advantage of his case in order to show the witnesses the spiritual healing of his message: He has the power to absolve sins. The healing of the paralytic is to serve as a lesson showing the redeeming power of Jesus in the absolving of sin. From this comes the syllogism: The healing of bodily illness is a response to healing the illness of the soul, or its captivity in sin. If Jesus has this power to cure bodily illness and unclean spirits, the more so has he the right over spiritual matters, forgiving sins which seem to be the source of true misfortune because of the death of the person’s soul. Today’s first reading also points to this spiritual aspect. “You burdened me with your sins. I wipe out your offenses and your sins I remember no more.” In Jesus Christ these words assume a specific form and content. This week Ash Wednesday begins the time of Lent. Last week we spoke on the theme of Ash Wednesday – today we continue it. Maybe more than one person thought about the beginning of the practice of sprinkling heads with ashes and why it is associated with Ash Wednesday. It started with the Christian penance practice in the fifth century when Lent began, on Monday preceding Sunday, and in the year 604 it was moved to Wednesday. It was the time of the public practice of the Sacrament of Reconciliation. This was a ritual of driving out public penitents from the church. After the confession the public penitents walked before the church where the bishop with presbyters sprinkled their foreheads with ashes and paraphrasing the words from the Book of Humankind: “Remember man that you are dust and into dust you will return; perform penance so that you will have life eternal” (3,19). After this they were sprinkled with holy water along with their clothes of penance which they wore during the entire time of Lent. Then they fell with their faces on the ground, and the congregation in church sang for them the Litany to All Saints; at the end they were exiled from church like Adam and Eve from paradise. In the tenth century the public penitents and other faithful gathered in the church, who also regarded themselves as sinners and wanted to do penance. From this, the Church (Pope Urban II) came out more and more against the spreading of the practice, and recommended to the Ecumenical Council in Benewence (1091) the practice of sprinkling heads with ashes on Wednesday at the beginning Lent for all the faithful. This practice then was accepted in the entire Church from the year 1099. Also the same Wednesday received the name “Ash Wednesday.” From the recommendation of this same Pope Urban II the ashes for sprinkling heads were taken from the burned palms from the preceding year distributed on Palm Sunday. And this is how it still is today. May God Bless us all! Fr. RIchard