Would you like communion with that?

A generation or two ago, when the threat of purgatory or limbo carried more weight, the renewing process of self-restraint, abstention, and repentance was recognised and celebrated.

Don't worry, today doesn't count.

Every January, the same promises appear again and again on New Year’s resolution lists. New items, like “less time online”, might be gaining in popularity, but exercising more, losing weight, and quitting smoking are hardy perennials. They keep appearing because they can be tough to achieve.

The chaplain at one of the country’s biggest universities has said only a small number of students are “anti-Church” and “make a lot of noise” and that many are “not completely disconnected” from their faith.

Pope Francis bowed his forehead to receive a dab of ashes, then smudged ashes in turn on the heads of other faithful during an Ash Wednesday service in an ancient Roman basilica.

According to the local priest, Paddy Mooney was service was implemented to meet the busy lives of the people of Glenamaddy.

May the odds be ever your favour.

USA: Police in LA say a photo they circulated of two people taken with a stolen Kindle has led to its return.

It's here.

It’s Ash Wednesday and Catholics worldwide are heading into mass today so a priest can make the sign of the cross in ash on their forehead.

ALREADY?! Shrove Tuesday has snuck up on us. Usually around now, time slows. There’s no bank holiday to look forward to. It feels like St Patrick’s Day and New Year’s Day are a year apart. New Year’s Day is a complete waste of a bank holiday, anyway.

A priest blessed with a talent for communicating with the masses has seized on the 50 Shades of Grey fever sweeping the nation to spread the faith.

In the beautiful setting of St Peter and Paul’s Church, the congregation has temporarily swelled to almost 300 people — all marking the start of Lent with heads bowed, knees bent, and foreheads daubed in ash.

ASH WEDNESDAY was the day when foreheads were marked with ash and the words ‘Memento, homo, quia pulvis es’ were said (or, in English, ‘Remember, man, that thou art dust’). 

I have a friend who has mixed feelings about Easter. For Lent, he gives up sobriety.

A health lab has warned priests of the dangers of ‘overcooking’ holy ashes after several mass-goers were scorched during Ash Wednesday ceremonies.

A weary Pope Benedict XVI has celebrated his final public Mass as pontiff.

Pope Benedict XVI urged an end to “religious hypocrisy” and “rivalry” in the Catholic Church as he donned his papal mitre for the last time at an emotional Mass in St Peter’s Basilica.

Cardinals have begun informal contacts to discuss who should next lead the Catholic Church through a period of major crisis as the Vatican said it planned a big send-off for Pope Benedict XVI before he became the first pontiff in centuries to resign.

Tomorrow, Ash Wednesday, has been designated National No Smoking Day, and the Irish Cancer Society is launching its first major campaign aimed at young women who smoke tobacco.

Smoking has become the latest — and most deadly — fashion statement for women, as lung cancer now kills more women in Ireland than breast cancer.

LAST night was due to be the start of the new NBA season in the US.

SOCIAL networking and the Stations of the Cross hardly seem natural companions, but one young priest is combining the two tomorrow in a bid to reach out to the tweeting generation.

THE Archbishop of Dublin, Diarmuid Martin, has denied his absence from a press conference by the Irish Hierarchy in Rome earlier this week was linked to any tension with his fellow bishops.

Anti-smoking campaigners today appealed to legislators to save children from the risks of passive smoking in cars.

Pope Benedict XVI urged Irish clergy to be courageous in confronting the paedophile priest scandal that has rocked the Catholic Church, but took no action on victims’ demands that he force top bishops to resign, the Vatican said.

THE Pope has summoned Irish bishops to an emergency meeting in Rome at which the fallout from the scandalous Murphy report into the rape and abuse of 320 children by 46 priests in the Dublin Archdiocese will be top of the agenda.

THOUSANDS of people are expected to go online to pray today — Ash Wednesday — as the computer gains in popularity as a virtual prayer book.

IT COSTS almost e3,000 a year to maintain a 20-a-day cigarette habit, more than enough to pay for the holiday of a lifetime.

THE annual surge in the purchase and consumption of fish that Ireland traditionally experiences on Ash Wednesday is set to reach a new high today.

Rio de Janeiro ended this year’s carnival parade in style today, wowing a capacity crowd of 60,000 revellers with a samba act celebrating Brazil’s African roots.

Children are still being exposed to major health risks by adults continuing to smoke tobacco in homes and cars, a new survey revealed today.

Chronic lung disease affects people of all ages in Ireland, a leading doctor said today.

ROMAN Catholic faithful prayed for Pope John Paul's recovery yesterday as he missed out on Ash Wednesday prayers that ushered in the solemn and sacred Lenten season for the first time in his 26-year papacy.

Ailing Pope John Paul II will miss out on today’s Ash Wednesday prayers that usher in the Lenten period – a first in his 26-year papacy.

JUST over one-in-10 people decided to quit smoking because of the ban in the workplace, a national survey shows.

Even the pouring rain couldn’t put a damper on Brazil's famed Rio de Janeiro carnival as tens of thousands of revellers took to the streets, dancing to the sound of samba drums on the second day of the annual celebration.

German pharmaceuticals and chemicals manufacturer, Boehringer Ingelheim, has said that GPs and respiratory units nationwide have been inundated with requests for spirometry testing following the Irish Thoracic Society's recent Ash Wednesday campaign.