It was hard not to see someone walking the streets or sitting in cafes just south of Philadelphia City Hall who didn’t bear the mark of Christ on their forehead Ash Wednesday. Odds are, they’d visited one neighborhood’s historic Catholic church and witnessed its devotion to serving the spiritual needs of Catholics on that day.
St. John the Evangelist Church on South 13th Street in center city buzzed with activity Feb. 18 as neighborhood residents, workers, shoppers, diners and travelers found 50 different ways to begin their Lenten observance through Masses, shorter liturgies or opportunities for the sacrament of penance amidst the cacophony of the big city on a midweek workday.
“We receive the ashes today. May it be a renewal,” Father Atolla Etuge, OFM Cap., said during a 1:05 p.m. Mass with at least 150 faithful in St. John’s upper church. “May it be a means of reconciliation with God and with your neighbor.”
His fellow Capuchin Franciscan Father Stephen Shin was simultaneously placing ashes on Catholics’ foreheads about 20 feet below in the smaller lower church during one of 44 10-minute services from 7 a.m. until 6 p.m.
“Repent and believe in the Gospel,” Father Shin shared with those in line. He had just finished hearing confessions a few feet away during the noon hour.
Catholics of all ages and backgrounds walked inside the 186-year-old church Wednesday to spend time with God in prayer. Many local workers have made it an annual tradition.
Kathleen Wallace leaves St. John the Evangelist Church on Feb. 18, Ash Wednesday, bearing the sign of ashes after attending a midday service. She was among thousands who stopped at the historic Center City parish to begin their Lenten journey.
“That’s true for a lot of people down here,” said Kathleen Wallace, ashes upon her forehead while walking south past a Halal food cart on 13th Street near the church. “I know last Ash Wednesday I ran into plenty of people from my office who had their ashes on after a midday Mass or service.”
Some attendees sported the traditional purple of the Lenten season. Some had just taken off their Sixers winter cap and wore Eagles lanyards carrying their work badges over their sport coats.
All walked out bearing the mark of the cross of Jesus, and most said they felt renewed and fortified for the 40-day journey of Lent.
“It’s just a really helpful, clear marker of the start of Lent and a time to really refocus on God in our lives and what that looks like on an individual level, but also as a community,” said Wallace, who regularly attends Mass at St. John the Evangelist or St. Patrick Church in the city’s Rittenhouse Square neighborhood.
“I think there’s something really cool about everybody coming together and walking with the same ash sign on our foreheads to just remember that we are all human and finite, and to kind of refocus our attention on the things that matter most.”
“Every time we send someone out on the street with ashes on their head, it’s going to remind other people, ‘Oh, it’s Ash Wednesday,’” said Father Tom Betz, OFM Cap., St. John’s pastor.
“I’m putting something on my head to say, ‘Hey, I’m with the Church. I’m one of those people. In case you didn’t know, I’m one of those people.’ It’s not boastful, but it does seem to be something that’s very public.”
The parish estimates that thousands of people come through the doors of St. John the Evangelist on what becomes the parish’s biggest day of the year, a day where the blessed activity inside the church’s walls matches the frenetic pulse of the city outside.
“Each of the shorter services consists of a brief prayer, the reading of the Gospel of the day, a brief homily and the giving of ashes to whoever’s in the church,” said Father Betz. “That’s about 10 minutes between the prayer, which is like four minutes, and the ashing, which is about six minutes.”
It takes a lot more than the nine priests, brothers and deacons on staff to meet thousands of Catholics’ needs for entering the penitential, reflective spirit of Lent.
“Each priest would take an hour, and then we would rotate that way with lots of lay volunteers to help us,” Father Betz said. “We have an army of volunteers.”
Joyce Granger has served as part of that Ash Wednesday army for “many, many, many moons.”
“I was raised this way, and it stayed with me,” she said. “So it’s a blessing to give back what God has given me and to be around my own.”
Patricia Jones converted to the Catholic faith with Joyce as her sponsor. Jones offered genuine smiles, rosary rings and Lenten prayer booklets as an energetic, warm, and loving sergeant in that army Wednesday afternoon.
“We’re here for one purpose, which is to do God’s work, uplift people and help people,” Jones said. “It’s always a good thing to come to this one little spot in the middle of all of this chaos in the middle of the city. It’s always a beacon of hope, a light.”
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