As you walk around campus throughout the day, you will likely see at least one person with a black mark on his forehead. Today, the Catholic Church marks the beginning of Lent with a day known as Ash Wednesday. On this campus, with a significant Catholic presence, Ash Wednesday is traditionally widely observed among those who practice Catholicism, even more so than significant feasts and holy days of obligation within the church.

Catholics who attend Mass at their church of worship today will receive ashes on their forehead. These ashes come from burnt palm branches used on Palm Sunday the previous year, and, as the priest uses them to mark the Sign of the Cross on foreheads, he says these or similar words: “Remember, you are dust and to dust you will return.”

These words serve as a reminder of human mortality, and the ashes represent the dust to which humans will eventually return. Also, as explained by Father Robert Altier, a priest in St. Paul, Minn., who appears weekly on Relevant Radio (a Catholic radio network), “The ashes also have another purpose for us. Throughout history, putting ashes upon one’s head is a sign of public penance.”

Altier continues, “In the ancient world of Judah of the Jewish people, they used to put on sackcloth and they would put ashes upon their heads and on their faces to be able to demonstrate that they were doing penance, that they were fasting and they were allowing themselves to suffer … So the ashes on our heads today also remind us of the penance that each one of us is to be doing during this Lenten season.” This penance refers, among other things, to fasting and the removal of sin that may prevent salvation.

Certainly many things in the Catholic Mass celebrated daily have deeper theological meaning, of which the Holy Eucharist is paramount. So the theological meaning of the ashes does not solely explain the widespread observance of this day among Catholics.

Last year, one of my friends suggested that perhaps the ashes give Catholics an especially unique way of identifying themselves as members of the church. Her suggestion that American Catholics have lost some of their identity seems especially correct and agreed on by others.

In his introduction to George Marlin’s “The American Catholic Voter,” Michael Barone writes, “American Catholics are as numerous as ever, more prosperous than ever, more diverse in their opinions than ever; but they are less of an identifiable bloc than they were well within living memory, when America had not elected a Catholic president.” Barone also explains that within the church, varying degrees of observance exist.

In the past 40 years, many American Catholics have adjusted their beliefs to blend in with society, even as politically correct thought has drifted away from notions of right and wrong. Catholics on this campus must resist the temptation to do the same on important issues frequently discussed at this university.

Contrary to popular (but fortunately slowly diminishing) belief, abortion is not merely a medical “choice,” but the taking of an innocent human life. Likewise, embryonic stem-cell research also destroys an innocent human life, regardless of how much money and jobs it brings to the university and the state. And no matter what our sick society and individuals at this university try to say, marriage is only between one man and one woman. Two men cannot be married and two women cannot be married.

Catholics on this campus have many occasions to speak out with both charity and resolve against these and other vital issues. On a day when Catholics will walk the campus with a visible sign that identifies their faith, they should consider these other ways of asserting their Catholic identity — opportunities that arise every day at this university.

Mark A. Baumgardner ([email protected]) is a senior majoring in electrical engineering.