Categorized | Community Events

Ashes to Go 3/1/17

Press Release

PERTH AMBOY/SOUTH AMBOY – St. Peter’s Episcopal Church, Perth Amboy, and Christ Episcopal Church, South Amboy, take Ash Wednesday to their local train stations.

On Ash Wednesday, March 1 2017 from 6:15 am to 8:30 am, St. Peter’s Episcopal Church in Perth Amboy, will once again be offering “Ashes to Go,” which brings a centuries-old Christian tradition outside the church walls at the Perth Amboy Train Station. This year Christ Episcopal Church in South Amboy is joining us in this nationwide movement at the South Amboy train station also from from 6:15 am to 8:30 am. “Ashes to Go” is an effort that has clergy and lay people visiting transit stops, street corners, coffee shops, and college campuses to mark the foreheads of interested passers-by with ashes and invite them to repent of past wrongdoing and seek forgiveness and renewal.

“Ashes are an ancient sign of penitence. From the Middle Ages it became the custom to begin Lent by being marked in ash with the sign of the cross. The reminder that we are dust turns our attention to God’s ability to heal the brokenness in our lives when we offer that brokenness to God. We take ashes to the street corner because that reminder of need, humility, and healing shouldn’t be confined to a church building.  We probably need it more when we are in the middle of our daily business! The ashes we receive are to remind us throughout the day of our need for God, and of God’s call to us.”[1]

“Ashes to Go” provides the opportunity to participate in that tradition for people who have lost their connection to a church, or have never participated before or who are not able to get to church on Ash Wednesday. As people get busier and busier, we need the church in new and non-traditional ways.  We especially need reminders of forgiveness and reconciliation in these divided times.

Contact Rev. Anne-Marie Jeffery/ ajeffery@stpetersepiscopal.com/ 732 826 1594 for more information about this event.  More information about the Ashes to Go movement can be found at www.AshesToGo.org

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