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'Toxic brand': Irish Tesla drivers want you to know they don't all support Trump and Elon Musk
Powering through and praying: Your stories of the GP crisis in Ireland
Michael Lowry says he was telling Paul Murphy 'to sit down with my fingers'
University College Dublin health and performance science student Lauren McElwaine from Donegal is pictred after attending Ash Wednesday mass which Archbishop Diarmuid Martin presided over today. Mark Stedman
You’ll see some Christian people walking around sporting marks on their head from where a priest has made a cross.
You will also see people queueing to buy fish because they’re not supposed to eat meat.
So, what’s the day all about?
What is Ash Wednesday?
Ash Wednesday is the beginning of Lent. So you now have to give up sweets, too.
Lent is the run-up to Easter and is meant to be a time of reflection, prayer and fasting.
On Ash Wednesday, the ashes of the palms from the last year’s Palm Sunday are placed on the heads of members of the congregation.
This is sometimes accompanied by the priest saying:
Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return
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Repent, and believe in the Gospel.
The day is seen as a way for Christians to remind themselves that they need to repent their sins.
What do the ashes mean?
The ashes are meant to signify penance, mourning and mortality.
In the beginning, people would put ashes on themselves and repent publicly, but this practice soon fell away.
You can remove the ashes as soon as you like, but many people wear them all day.
Why are people told not to eat meat?
While this is not mentioned in the Bible – in fact there is no direct mention of wearing ashes at all – Church law says that Catholics over the age of 14 should abstain from meat.
They should also only eat one full meal and two small snacks, although this part only applies for people aged 18-59.
The fasting reminds Catholics of penance.
Abstention from meat is observed on Fridays during Lent, but this is only church-mandated on Good Friday.
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@Éanna o Sca: As long as we still have McCabe, we’re going to win every single game. She will score five or six goals at every match. No need for the other ten players or a manager, for that matter !
@Stiles: Exactly. It was Pauw who spilled to the press about McCabe wanting Farrelly to be taken off. Perfectly normal (and private) conversation between captain and manager. She knew what she was doing and it blew up in her face. Cute hoor and it seems she conned quite a few of the low information commenters on here.
@Louis Jacob: All other issues aside, don’t pretend it’s normal for a player to demand of the manager to take off a certain player. That’s totally overstepping the mark. I remember doing it once many moons ago and being pulled aside by a very experienced teammate (ex pro) who pulled me aside after game and told me in no uncertain terms never to do it again.
@Brian M: fair play, at least you learned from that. This group of Irish girls will win absolutely zero with McCabe/Caldwell at the helm calling the shots. At least the first part is gone. No place for egos when the quality available is shockingly poor. Vera did an unbelievable job with those players.
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