98 Fun Facts About Lent

Lent's forty days are modelled on which biblical episode?

Jesus fasting in the desert: the Gospels set that fast just before he began his public ministry, and Lent copies it as preparation for Easter.

Where does the word 'Lent' come from?

An Old English term for spring: lencten meant springtime, probably because the days grow longer in that season.

In Western churches, why are Sundays not counted as fasting days in Lent?

Sundays are always the Lord's Day, a weekly celebration of the resurrection, so they are never fast days; that is why the calendar count runs past forty.

When does the Catholic liturgical season of Lent end?

On the evening of Holy Thursday: the season closes as the Mass of the Lord's Supper begins, and after its Gloria the church bells fall silent.

What are the three traditional pillars of Lent?

Prayer, fasting and almsgiving: in Matthew 6, Jesus urges that all three be done in secret, not for show.

What is giving up a personal pleasure for Lent commonly called?

A Lenten sacrifice: it is a voluntary custom, since church law itself only demands fasting and abstinence on set days.

Ash Wednesday can fall on which holiday?

Valentine's Day: Ash Wednesday moves with Easter, and in 2024 it fell on 14 February, so Catholics faced a fast on a night of romantic dinners.

Which words are said as the ashes are imposed?

Remember that you are dust: the words echo God's sentence on Adam in Genesis 3:19, and the missal also offers 'Repent, and believe in the Gospel'.

The 'shrove' in Shrove Tuesday comes from a verb meaning what?

To absolve through confession: Christians went to church that day to confess and be shriven before the fast began.

Why are pancakes associated with the day before Lent?

They use up eggs, milk and butter: households cleared out rich foods before the fast, and pancake races grew out of the same custom.

Which English town claims a pancake race dating from 1445?

Olney: tradition says a housewife heard the church bell in 1445 and ran to church still holding her frying pan, and since 1950 the town has raced Liberal, Kansas.

Which treat is eaten in Poland on Tłusty Czwartek, the last Thursday before Lent?

Pączki: Polish communities around Detroit hold a Pączki Day of their own, with queues outside bakeries.

What does 'Mardi Gras' mean in French?

Fat Tuesday refers to the last day of eating rich, fatty food before the fast begins the following morning.

What are the social organisations that stage New Orleans Mardi Gras parades called?

Krewes: the spelling is a deliberately old-fashioned take on 'crew', thought to have been coined by the Mistick Krewe of Comus.

At Ivrea's carnival in Italy, teams said to recall a revolt against a tyrant pelt each other with what?

Oranges: throwers on foot play the rebels and those on carts the tyrant's guards, after a legendary miller's daughter defied him.

As of 2025, which carnival is recognised by Guinness World Records as the largest in the world?

Rio de Janeiro: in 2021 the Covid-19 pandemic forced the city to call off its carnival.

In 1823, which city held the first Rose Monday parade of its modern carnival?

Cologne: when the 1991 parade was called off over the Gulf War, locals marched its route anyway in an anti-war protest.

What does the Sunday before Easter commemorate?

Christ's entry into Jerusalem: the crowd waved palm branches, long a symbol of victory, to greet him as a king.

According to the gospels, which animal did Jesus ride on Palm Sunday?

A donkey: Matthew presents the ride as fulfilling a prophet's words about a king arriving meek and riding on an ass.

In colder climates, which trees' branches have been carried in place of palms on Palm Sunday?

Box, olive, willow and yew: the swap ran so deep that the day itself was even called Yew Sunday.

On which day does Great Lent begin in Eastern Christianity?

Clean Monday: in Greece and Cyprus it is a public holiday spent on outdoor excursions, and people fly kites.

How does the Eastern count of the forty days differ from the Western one?

The arithmetic is the mirror image of the Western scheme. Fasting continues through Holy Week regardless.

Which foods are most commonly given up during Great Lent?

Meat, eggs, dairy and oil: meat is given up a week before eggs and dairy, so the fast tightens in stages before Lent begins.

The first Sunday of Great Lent celebrates the ninth-century return of what to Byzantine churches?

Icons: after the iconoclast emperor Theophilos died, his widow Theodora lifted the ban, and the images were carried back into the churches in procession.

In Eastern Christianity, when is the Lenten fast finally broken?

After the Paschal Vigil: the fast runs on through Holy Week, so the first meal comes in the small hours of Easter morning.

Which two days are obligatory days of fasting and abstinence for Catholics?

Ash Wednesday and Good Friday: one opens the season and the other marks the crucifixion, so both call for fasting as well as going without meat.

What does Britain's monarch hand out on Maundy Thursday?

Silver coins: the ceremony grew out of an older custom in which the sovereign washed poor people's feet on that day.

What may a Catholic eat on a fast day?

One full meal, two small ones: the two smaller meals together must not equal a full meal, and church law does not restrict drinks.

Under Catholic abstinence rules, which of these counts as meat?

Chicken counts as meat: the rule covers the flesh of warm-blooded land animals and birds, which is why poultry is forbidden on Lenten Fridays.

A Cincinnati franchisee's fish sandwich for Catholics on Lenten Fridays became a menu staple at which chain?

McDonald's: company boss Ray Kroc backed his own meatless Hula Burger, but the fish sandwich outsold it and stayed on the menu.

Under Catholic canon law, abstinence from meat is prescribed on which days throughout the year?

Canon 1251 prescribes abstinence from meat on every Friday of the year unless a solemnity falls on it, though bishops' conferences may let the faithful substitute another penance.

What separates fasting from going without meat?

Abstinence generally means going without meat, but not dairy or fish. Fasting limits the amount eaten rather than the type.

In Milan's Ambrosian Rite, on which day does Lent begin?

The Sunday after Ash Wednesday: in Pope Gregory the Great's time, Rome seems to have started Lent on that Sunday, until four days were added to make forty fasting days.

Which ecumenical council's canons may hold the earliest reference to a forty-day Lent?

Nicaea: its fifth canon, from 325, sets a synod 'before the fortieth' so that bitterness is put aside and the gift offered to God is pure.

In which country do some penitents have themselves literally crucified on Good Friday?

The Philippines: the country's Catholic bishops have warned penitents against it, calling such displays spiritual vanity.

Which practice happens in the last two weeks of Lent in some traditions?

Statues and crosses are veiled: the custom was linked to the Gospel read as the fortnight begins, in which Jesus hid himself from a crowd.

What colour do Catholic priests wear for most of Lent?

Purple: violet signals penance, so the Church also uses it for penitential Masses and for Masses for the dead.

Which spiced bun is traditionally eaten in Britain on Good Friday?

Hot cross bun: once a treat for Good Friday and Easter, it is now sold all year round in shops in Britain and Australia.

Which name covers Good Friday, Holy Saturday and Easter Sunday as one celebration?

The Easter Triduum: before reforms in the 1950s its night-time services had crept so early that they were held on Saturday morning.

Which wild flower is known in England and Wales as the 'Lent lily'?

Daffodil: its bulbs are poisonous, yet a compound found in them, galantamine, is used to treat Alzheimer's disease.

Which word of praise do Western churches drop from their services throughout Lent?

Alleluia: Eastern churches, by contrast, keep singing it right through Lent, even at services for the dead.

The midweek day of Holy Week, recalling Judas's bargain to betray Jesus, has which nickname?

Spy Wednesday: the name casts Judas as a spy within the Twelve, since that day's Gospel tells of his bargain with the chief priests.

Medieval writer Giraldus Cambrensis reported which animal's tail being eaten as 'fish' during the Lenten fast?

Beaver: medieval churchmen let people eat its scaly, fishlike tail on meatless days, and Gerald said it had the taste and colour of fish.

In Danish Fastelavn, children knock down a sweet-filled barrel in a custom said to symbolise battling what?

Evil: until the 1800s a live cat was shut inside, since folk belief tied cats to evil, and it ran free once the barrel broke.

What does 'laetare', the name for Lent's fourth Sunday, mean in Latin?

Rejoice: on that Sunday flowers may return to the altar and priests may wear rose instead of the usual Lenten colour.

Which pope's 1966 constitution Paenitemini cut Catholic obligatory fasting to just two days?

Paul VI: before his 1966 reform, adult Catholics had fasted on all the weekdays of Lent, not on just two days.

Eastern Orthodox Christians often describe Great Lent with which two-word phrase?

Bright sadness: Lent's grief over sin is meant to be lit from within by the joy of God's forgiveness, the paradox the phrase captures.

Which reformer defended people who ate sausages during Lent in 1522?

Huldrych Zwingli: his sermon argued that the Bible sets no ban on meat in Lent, and the row sparked the Reformation in Zurich.

Which baked snack, long linked with Lent, has a shape said to recall arms crossed in prayer?

Pretzel dough needed only flour and water, which suited the strict Lenten fast. One popular tale credits an Italian monk in 610 with twisting the first as a reward for his pupils.

In French tradition, what is said to fly to Rome on Holy Thursday and return at Easter with eggs?

Church bells fall silent from Holy Thursday, and the story explains why: they have flown off to Rome. On Easter morning they are said to come home bringing coloured eggs and sweets.

Which word for enforced isolation comes from a Venetian term meaning 'forty days', the length of Lent?

Quarantine began as quarantena, a forty-day isolation imposed in the 14th and 15th centuries. It followed the trentino, a thirty-day wait first ordered at Ragusa, modern Dubrovnik, in 1377.

Which ring-shaped Mardi Gras dessert traditionally hides a tiny plastic baby for a lucky guest?

King cake's hidden baby is said to bring luck and prosperity to whoever finds it. Bakers now often leave the figure outside the cake so that buyers can hide it themselves.

Which Italian city's mask-filled carnival was abolished in 1797 and only revived in 1979?

Venice once let its citizens go masked for a large part of the year. Its mask makers held a special place in society, with their own guild and a statute dated 1436.

Which composer, aged fourteen, reputedly wrote out Allegri's Holy Week Miserere from memory after one hearing?

Mozart heard the psalm at a Holy Week service in the Sistine Chapel in 1770, a story that rests on one letter from his father. Within months the pope had awarded the boy the Order of the Golden Spur.

Which rodent is a popular Lenten dish in Venezuela, where legend says the Church once exempted it?

Capybara is the largest living rodent and spends much of its life in and around fresh water. Its meat stays popular in Venezuela right through Holy Week, when other meats are off the table.

In Spain, carnival traditionally ends on Ash Wednesday with the mock funeral of which fish?

Sardine funerals parody a real procession and end with a symbolic figure going up in flames. Goya painted a riotous Madrid version, and the rite is known as the Entierro de la Sardina.

In which country was selling alcohol on Good Friday illegal until a change in the law in 2018?

Ireland's pubs and off-licences generally stayed shut for the day under the old ban. Oddly, Good Friday is not an official public holiday in the Republic.

Which country's deadly Ash Wednesday fires swept through two states in one day in February 1983?

Australia lost 75 people in a single day as more than 180 fires tore through Victoria and South Australia. South Australia declared a state of disaster for the first time in its history.

Which Lenten devotion leads worshippers past fourteen scenes from the day of Jesus's crucifixion?

Stations of the Cross were spread by the Franciscans, who built outdoor shrines across Europe to echo the Holy Land's pilgrim route. The number of stops was only fixed at fourteen in 1731.

At which ancient Roman landmark does the pope lead a torchlit procession each Good Friday?

The Colosseum was endorsed as a sacred site in 1749 by Benedict XIV, who held that early Christians had been martyred there. He also forbade anyone to quarry its stone.

Which American university announces its Laetare Medal each year on the fourth Sunday of Lent?

Notre Dame first gave the medal in 1883, conceiving it as an American version of a papal award, the Golden Rose. John F. Kennedy is among those who have received it.

Which British celebration, three weeks before Easter, grew from Lenten visits to a home church?

Mothering Sunday later became the day domestic servants were let off work to visit their mother church, usually with their families. Constance Adelaide Smith revived it from 1913.

Which British fruit dessert is topped with eleven marzipan balls, one for each apostle except Judas?

Simnel cake was first baked for the one Sunday in Lent when the fast was relaxed. It carries marzipan twice over, with one layer in the middle and another on top.

Which Old Testament figure's forty-day fast on Mount Sinai is one biblical model for Lent's length?

Moses is described as going without bread or water for forty days and nights on the mountain. Elijah's forty-day journey to Mount Horeb is counted as another model for the season.

The Second Vatican Council called Lent a season of penance and of preparing for which sacrament?

Baptism of new converts is one of the great ceremonies of Easter Eve. In the early Church, the instruction and discipline that came before it could last up to three years.

Which Hebrew cry, originally meaning 'save, we pray', do crowds shout in the Palm Sunday gospels?

Hosanna began as a cry for help in Psalm 118 and turned into a shout of acclamation. Catholics repeat it at every Mass, because the gospel verse forms part of the Sanctus.

The 'Maundy' in Maundy Thursday comes from a Latin word meaning what?

Commandment points to Jesus telling the apostles to love one another, words he spoke after washing their feet. The same Latin root gives English the word 'mandate'.

At which place at the foot of the Mount of Olives did Jesus pray on the night of his arrest?

Gethsemane takes its name from an oil press. Four separate sites near the foot of the mount are each claimed by a different denomination as the true spot.

Which woman of legend gave Jesus her veil on the road to Calvary and got it back bearing his image?

Veronica appears nowhere in the canonical gospels. One theory holds that her name grew out of the Latin for 'true image', a label first given to the cloth itself.

Which Holy Week service, named from the Latin for 'darkness', puts out its candles one by one?

Tenebrae ends with the strepitus, a sudden loud noise made once the church is completely dark. The candles sit on a stand in the sanctuary known as a hearse.

At which Holy Thursday morning service does a bishop bless the oils for the year's sacraments?

Chrism Mass gathers a diocese's priests around their bishop in the cathedral. Each parish then takes home its share of the three oils, a stock meant to last the whole year.

Which hymn of praise, sung at Mass on most Sundays, is left out throughout Lent and Advent?

The Gloria only dropped out of Advent after the twelfth century, once that season came to be treated as a penitential time in imitation of Lent.

Which colour of vestments do Catholic priests wear on both Palm Sunday and Good Friday?

Red, the colour of blood, recalls the Passion that both days commemorate. The older form of the Roman Rite used black on Good Friday instead.

Which saint's March feast traditionally lifted Lenten curbs on food and drink for a day of revelry?

Saint Patrick's feast is moved when 17 March lands in Holy Week, as it did in 1940 and 2008. That clash will not come round again until 2160.

Which saint's 19 March feast is marked in Sicily with tables of meatless food shared with the poor?

Saint Joseph is said to have ended a medieval famine in Sicily by sending rain, and the banquet thanks him. Because the day falls in Lent, the tables traditionally carry no meat.

Which 25 March feast, marking the angel Gabriel's message to Mary, usually falls during Lent?

The Annunciation sits nine months before Christmas. A council at Constantinople in 692 made it the only festival, Sundays aside, that could be observed during Lent.

Lent moves each year because Easter is tied to the first full moon after which astronomical event?

The vernal equinox is fixed at 21 March in the Church's reckoning, whatever the sky is doing. The drift of that date from the real event is what prompted the Gregorian calendar reform.

Which Spanish city's Holy Week is famed for hooded penitents escorting huge floats known as pasos?

Seville's penitents wear tall pointed hoods with eye-holes so that they can repent in anonymity. Religious brotherhoods carry each float from their home church to the cathedral and back.

In Antigua Guatemala, Holy Week processions tread on elaborate street carpets made of dyed what?

Sawdust carpets are laid by whole families using moulds, with pine needles, fruit and flowers worked into the designs. The Spanish brought the custom to Latin America in colonial times.

Which stuffed pasta from Swabia is jokingly said to hide its meat filling from God during Lent?

Maultaschen tuck their meat inside pasta dough, where the joke says God cannot see it. Swabians have a nickname for the dish that means 'small God-cheaters'.

Which reptile did the Archdiocese of New Orleans rule in 2010 to be seafood, fit for Lenten Fridays?

Alligator belongs to the 'fish family' for the purposes of the Friday fast, the archdiocese declared. That put it on the menu for Ash Wednesday as well.

Which Gulf Coast city claims America's oldest official Carnival celebration, begun in 1703?

Mobile was the capital of French Louisiana at the time. Local tradition dates its first parade to 1711, when sixteen men are said to have pushed a cart carrying a large papier-mâché cow's head.

At Louisiana's Courir de Mardi Gras, masked riders go farm to farm begging ingredients for which dish?

Gumbo for the whole community is cooked at the end of the route. A captain leads the riders on horseback, and anyone who hands over food or money is thanked with a dance.

Which feast, twelve days after Christmas, traditionally opens the Carnival season in New Orleans?

Epiphany has been recognised as the start of the city's Carnival since at least 1900. The Twelfth Night Revelers, founded in 1870, mark the night with a masked ball.

Germany's carnival 'fifth season' officially opens at 11:11 a.m. on the eleventh day of which month?

November 11 opens a season that runs all the way to Ash Wednesday. Its main festivities come months later, in the final days before the fast begins.

Which Swiss city begins its carnival at exactly 4 a.m. on the Monday after Ash Wednesday?

Basel's revellers march off in the dark for the Morgestraich and then keep going for exactly 72 hours. The carnival ends at 4 a.m. on the Thursday.

Which Slavic festival fills the week before Great Lent with blini, sleigh rides and a straw effigy?

Maslenitsa also goes by Crepe Week and Cheesefare Week. Russians bake blini for it, while Belarusians and Ukrainians cook pierogi and syrniki.

Which strong beer did Munich's Paulaner friars first brew, reputedly as 'liquid bread' for fasts?

Doppelbock from Paulaner still carries the name Salvator, and other brewers signal the style with names that end in -ator, such as Celebrator and Optimator.

Which cardamom bun, filled with almond paste and whipped cream, is Sweden's Shrove Tuesday treat?

Semla gained its cream and almond paste after the Reformation relaxed Lenten observance. Swedes then took to eating one every Tuesday between Shrove Tuesday and Easter.

In Greece, families traditionally mark the first day of Great Lent with picnics and by flying what?

Kites go up across Greece that day as a symbol of trying to reach the divine. The public holiday also brings shellfish and lagana, an unleavened bread baked only for the occasion.

Which man raised from the dead at Bethany gives his name to the day before Orthodox Palm Sunday?

Lazarus Saturday and the day after it are days of joy set between the penitence of Great Lent and the mourning of Holy Week. Greek churches spend it plaiting crosses from palm leaves.

On the last Sunday before Great Lent, Orthodox Christians bow to one another and ask for what?

Forgiveness is sought at Vespers that evening, often with a deep bow known as a poklon. Relatives and friends may hand each other small presents as well.

Which country's Orthodox Church keeps a 55-day fast before Easter, a feast known there as Fasika?

Ethiopia's fast strings three periods together: the eight-day Fast of Heraclius, the forty days of Lent proper and a final week for the Passion.

Which poet published 'Ash-Wednesday' in 1930, three years after converting to Anglicanism?

T. S. Eliot's long work is often called his conversion poem and builds on Dante's Purgatorio. It first appeared as a small book limited to 600 numbered and signed copies.

Which 2000 film follows a newcomer who unsettles a French village during Lent?

Chocolat stars Juliette Binoche as a sweet-shop owner, and the village mayor speaks out against her for tempting people during the fast. The film received five Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture.

Which Flemish painter crowded a 1559 village square into 'The Fight Between Carnival and Lent'?

Pieter Bruegel painted his Netherlandish Proverbs in the same year. X-rays have since revealed that parts of the picture were changed by an unknown hand.

Which actor-director released 'The Passion of the Christ' in American cinemas on Ash Wednesday 2004?

Mel Gibson shot the film with dialogue entirely in reconstructed Aramaic, Hebrew and Latin. He co-wrote the script in English before a Jesuit professor translated it.

Which English university holds five days of college rowing races each winter known as the Lent Bumps?

Cambridge crews set off in a line and try to touch or overtake the boat ahead before being caught themselves. The Lents split away from the older May Bumps in 1887.