According to the Armenian Church’s liturgy, Lent begins on the Sunday of the Assumption, this year on March 2, 2025.

The first day of Lent is called “Ash Day,” when the priest sprinkles ashes in the shape of a cross on the head of the believer, reciting the following words: “Remember, O man, that you were dust, and to dust you shall return.”

On this occasion, Father Sahag Keshishian, the chaplain of the Armenian Catholic Mesrobian High School and parish priest of the St. Savior Church, explained the meaning of the day to the students during the gatherings held at the church.

The days of Great Lent symbolize Christ’s forty-day period of prayer, fasting, and repentance in the desert. After His baptism, Jesus “was led up in the Spirit into the desert and being tempted forty days by the devil. He neither ate nor drank in those days (Luke 4:1-3). Jesus subjected Himself to fasting for the salvation of the human race, He Himself repented on behalf of humanity so that the repentance of all who fast might receive meaning and reality through His fasting. The Forty-Day Lent is followed by another one week-long period of fasting, Holy Week. That is why the Lent called the Forty-Day Lent lasts 48 days.

The period of Great Lent consists of seven remarkable Sundays: Eve of Great Lent, Sunday of Expulsion, Sunday of the Lost (Prodigal) Son, Sunday of the Steward, Sunday of the Judge, Sunday of Advent and Palm Sunday.