Solemnity
Ash Wednesday
Ash Wednesday — a solemnity of the General Roman Calendar celebrated during Lent.
Liturgy
Loading the latest published content…
Loading the latest published content…
Liturgy
Formation through the structure, symbolism, and historical continuity of the Church.
Solemnity
Ash Wednesday — a solemnity of the General Roman Calendar celebrated during Lent.
Liturgical season
The day that opens Lent, when ashes are placed on the heads of the faithful as a sign of repentance and of the forty days of fasting, prayer, and almsgiving that lead to Easter.
Memorial
Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of the Church — a memorial of the General Roman Calendar celebrated during Ordinary Time.
Optional memorial
Blessed Virgin Mary of Loreto — an optional memorial of the General Roman Calendar celebrated during Advent.
Liturgical season
The Christmas Octave and Season, from Christmas Eve through the Feast of the Baptism of the Lord.
Liturgical season
The octave day of Easter, given the additional title of Divine Mercy Sunday by Saint John Paul II in 2000, whose Gospel is the Lord's gift of peace and the forgiveness of sins.
Liturgical season
The fifty-day Easter Season culminating in Pentecost — celebrated as 'one great Sunday.'
Solemnity
Easter Vigil — a solemnity of the General Roman Calendar celebrated during Easter Triduum.
Glossary term
Ancient days of prayer, fasting, and procession by which the Church begs God's blessing on human labor and the fruits of the earth and gives him thanks for them.
Mass structure
The rite in which the Eucharist is exposed for adoration and the assembly is blessed with the Blessed Sacrament, an extension of the worship offered in the Mass.
Feast
December 12 honors Our Lady of Guadalupe, who appeared to Saint Juan Diego at Tepeyac in 1531 and is venerated as Patroness of the Americas; in the dioceses of the United States the day is kept as a feast.
Feast
On November 30 the Church honors Andrew, the brother of Peter and the first to be called, whose feast stands at the threshold of Advent.
Feast
On August 24 the Church honors the apostle named in the lists of the Twelve and traditionally identified with Nathanael, the Israelite without guile.
Feast
On July 25 the Church honors James the son of Zebedee, one of the three closest to the Lord and the first of the apostles to be martyred.
Feast
On December 27, the third day of Christmas, the Church honors the beloved disciple who stood at the Cross and wrote the Gospel of the Word made flesh.
Feast
On August 10 the Church honors the deacon of Rome who was martyred in 258 and who presented the poor to his persecutors as the treasures of the Church.
Feast
On October 18 the Church honors the evangelist and companion of Saint Paul who wrote both the third Gospel and the Acts of the Apostles.
Feast
On April 25 the Church honors the evangelist whose short and urgent Gospel, associated by ancient tradition with the preaching of Saint Peter, is read in Year B.
Feast
On September 21 the Church honors the tax collector called from his customs post, apostle and evangelist, whose Gospel is read in Year A.
Feast
On May 14 the Church honors the disciple chosen to take the place left by Judas, the one apostle called to the Twelve after the Ascension.
Feast
September 29 honors the three archangels named in Scripture, joined in a single feast in the revised General Roman Calendar.
Feast
Two of the Twelve are honored together on May 3, their joint feast rooted in the Roman basilica where their relics were enshrined.
Feast
On October 28 the Church honors two of the Twelve about whom the Gospels say very little, joined in one celebration since their relics were venerated together in Rome.
Feast
The day after Christmas the Church honors the deacon Stephen, the first to give his life for Christ, whose death is recorded in the Acts of the Apostles.
Feast
On July 3 the Church honors the apostle whose doubt became the clearest confession of Christ's divinity in the Gospels: "My Lord and my God."
Feast
The feast that closes the Christmas Season, commemorating the baptism of Jesus by John in the Jordan.
Feast
Kept on February 22, this feast honors not a relic of wood but the office of teaching and governing that Christ entrusted to Peter and to those who succeed him.
Feast
Celebrated on January 25, this feast commemorates the encounter with the risen Christ on the road to Damascus that turned the persecutor Saul into the Apostle to the Gentiles.
Feast
On November 9 the whole Church keeps the dedication of the cathedral of Rome, mother and head of all the churches of the City and of the world.
Feast
A feast glorying in the Cross of Christ as the instrument of salvation.