Lent · Holymap

The story behind the day

Lent is the season of repentance, fasting and prayer with which many Christians prepare for Easter. In the West it opens on Ash Wednesday, 46 days before Easter, and the forty days are counted without the Sundays. In the Orthodox churches the season is called Great Lent; it begins on a Monday, 48 days before Pascha, and is reckoned by the Julian tables, so it often falls later than the Western Lent.^[1–4]

Origins

Lent is a season of preparation for Easter, and its length is rooted in Scripture. The Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches that through the forty days the Church shares each year in Jesus's time of testing in the desert, and the Church of England likewise notes that the season's length recalls the temptation of Christ in the wilderness.^[6]

What it marks

For Anglicans, Lent is a time of self-examination, penitence and self-denial, and for Catholics a season of prayer, fasting and almsgiving; the Church of England also names charity. The Catechism describes Lent, along with each Friday, as a time of especially concentrated penance, suited to fasting and almsgiving. In the Orthodox Church the Ecumenical Patriarch calls Great Lent the blessed period of fasting and repentance, in which the forty days look ahead to the joy of Pascha.^{[1, 5, 7]}

How it came to be

Christians have not always counted the forty days in the same way. The West now counts the days continuously to the end of Holy Week, leaving out Sundays, which always celebrate the resurrection, and the season begins on Ash Wednesday, 46 days before Easter. From the Middle Ages, Western Christians began the season by receiving the sign of the cross in ashes.^{[2, 8–9]}

How it is kept

Clean Monday kite-flying on a Greek hillIllustration · AI-generated

On Ash Wednesday ashes are applied to the forehead as a sign of penance, with words such as the reminder that we are dust. In the Catholic Church, Ash Wednesday and Good Friday are days of fasting and abstinence, and Fridays in Lent are days of abstinence from meat. In the Orthodox Church the fast begins on the first Monday of Great Lent and continues until Holy Saturday, and Orthodox Christians speak of fasting from passions as well as from food. The first Sunday of Great Lent is kept as the Sunday of Orthodoxy.^{[3, 9–11]}

Across traditions

Orthodox churches reckon the date of Pascha by older tables based on the Julian calendar, so Great Lent often begins later than Ash Wednesday, and the two Easters can be several weeks apart. Anglican, Catholic and Orthodox Christians each keep Lent with their own disciplines.^{[4, 12]}

Sources

Each statement above was checked against published sources; the verdict says whether it stood as written, was corrected or was hedged.