What Is #Ashtag? Ash Wednesday Now Means Snapping Selfies For Catholics Around The World

One Wednesday every winter, it’s not unusual to see people walking around with a black mark smeared on their foreheads. That’s because those people have visited their churches on Ash Wednesday, the first day of Lent. The ashes are meant to remind Catholics that “you are dust and to dust you shall return," as priests say — in other words, the body is only physical, and parishioners must prepare for death.

It’s a somber message for a somber day, but that doesn’t stop some Catholics from opening camera apps on their phone and posting Instagram selfies with wide grins. In fact, there’s an entire hashtag for people who want to share their ashes on the internet: #ashtag.

But the ashtag trend has its critics, and the debate on whether the ashtag is appropriate has grown louder every year. Two years ago, a theology professor from Bellarmine University took to Twitter to voice his doubts about the trend.

Indeed, the Ash Wednesday gospel reading seems to teach a lesson that might be seen as a sharp critique of the ashtag. In the New Revised Standard Version Bible, Jesus said:

“So whenever you give alms, do not sound a trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, so that they may be praised by others…. But when you give alms, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your alms may be done in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you.”

But others argue that the ashtag is appropriate, a way to spread Catholic teachings without even a word.

“Ash Wednesday is a day when we literally wear our faith on our forehead,” Julianne Stanz, director of new evangelization for the Diocese of Green Bay, Wisconsin, said. “We become, on this day, a visual extension of the love of Christ—a love which transcends time and distance, whether in the real world or the virtual world.”