Pope Francis opened the season of Lent with a traditional Ash Wednesday Mass and urged Catholics to avoid sharing their lives on social media. He emphasized the importance of quiet reflection and prayer during this 40-day period of penance, which leads to Easter.
Pope Francis urged Catholics to forgo worldly trappings and focus on essentials as he opened the season of Lent with a traditional Ash Wednesday Mass on one of Rome's historic seven hills. He criticized people's tendency to lay bare their lives on social media , deploring 'a world in which everything, including our emotions and deepest feelings, has to become 'social'.
' Instead, the faithful should enter their 'inner chamber' to find time for quiet reflection and prayer, the 87-year-old pontiff said in a homily. Lent is a 40-day period of penance which leads to Easter, the most important Christian festival which celebrates the day on which Christians believe Jesus rose from the dead. It represents the 40 days Jesus is said in the Bible to have spent fasting in the desert. During the season, Catholics are asked to fast, remember the needy and reflect on mortality. 'Life is not a play: Lent invites us to come down from the stage and return to the heart, to the reality of who we are,' Francis sai
Pope Francis Catholics Lent Ash Wednesday Mass Social Media Reflection Prayer Penance Easter
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