ELKHART-Father Glenn Kohrman and staff at St. Vincent de Paul Catholic Parish were busy Tuesday preparing for today's Ash Wednesday celebrations.

The ornately decorated church on Main Street in Elkhart was being festooned in purple swags, draped from one stained glass window to the next. Two purple banners with the Greek word “Metanoia” down the front adorned the wall behind the lectern.

“Metanoia is Greek for ‘transformation,'” said Rev. Glenn Kohrman, who is St. Vincent's pastor.

Purple, the color of Lent and Advent, symbolizes both penance and royalty, Kohrman said, explaining that Roman royalty wore purple togas.

The holiday marks the beginning of Lent, or the 40-day fast -- from Ash Wednesday to Easter Sunday, minus the Sundays in between -- to reflect on the biblical story of Jesus Christ's 40 days in the desert, he said.

St. Vincent will celebrate Ash Wednesday with recitations from the Old Testament, the New Testament and the Gospel; followed by a homily and distribution of ashes.

The ashes mark the foreheads as a way to say, “Look at how I fall short,” Korhman said. It's a way to show that the person is repentant.

The church, which has 6,000 parishioners, is expecting to see between 1,500 and 2,000 people or more throughout the day Wednesday, he said. “On a weekend, we have about 1,900 come.”

Parishioners who celebrated Palm Sunday at the church last year were each given a palm branch, which they returned Wednesday, Feb. 15, this year, to be burned into ashes for use in this year's Ash Wednesday, Kohrman said.

Ash Wednesday will include several Masses throughout the day at St. Vincent.

St. Vincent will begin Ash Wednesday at 7 a.m. with an English Mass, followed at 8:30 a.m. by another English Mass. Then, at 12:10 and 4 p.m., there will be the Liturgy of the Word, first in English and then in Spanish. At 5:30 p.m. there will be another Mass, with a choir in English and will end with Mass and Spanish choir at 7:15 p.m. Each Mass will include the distribution of ashes.

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