From palms to ashes: the circle of Lent
Father Joseph Moreno and parishioners burn palm leaves from Holy Week 2025 in order to make ashes for Ash Wednesday, at St. Michael Parish in Bedford on Feb. 2, 2026. (NTC/Juan Guajardo)
As Deacon Guillermo Muñoz and others set up a portable fire pit outside Bedford's St. Michael Parish on Jan. 26, Father Joseph Moreno delivered a prayer for the 10 or so gathered.
“God of tenderness and mercy,” Fr. Moreno said. “You fashioned us from the dust of the earth and bid us to follow your Gospel call.
“Look on us with kindness as we prepare these ashes, which will mark the beginning of our Lenten journey.”
Following that, Dcn. Muñoz set fire to palms collected from years previous, which parishioners had dropped off at the church to be properly disposed of. The fire took quite a bit of time given the bumper crop of palms returned to the parish over the past several years and required several reloads into the pit as fire consumed the palms.
“We may be here all day,” Dcn. Muñoz said with a laugh.
One attendee, eying the blaze's rising smoke column, joked that some passerby might summon firefighters. The deacon and others stirred the burning mixture now and then to better distribute the ashes — ashes the parish will use for Ash Wednesday distribution on Feb. 18.
Fr. Moreno, who was assigned to St. Michael last year after Lent, said he's unsure whether previous priests ever burned palms for ashes on site. Many parishes, Fr. Moreno added, simply purchase packets of ashes from religious supply stores.
“This is something to see,” Dcn. Muñoz said. “I knew the ashes for Ash Wednesday came from burned palms from previous years, but I've never seen it done.”
Neither had St. Michael Parish Coordinator Kimberly Guidry Speirs, who livestreamed the burning ceremony on the parish's Facebook page.
“I have to admit I just never really thought about it,” Speirs said. “I guess, when I was a kid, someone told me the ashes come from palms from the year before, but I never gave it a second thought after that.”
Speirs said she loved that Fr. Moreno decided to burn the palms on site for parishioners to watch.
“This is really eye opening to see the life cycle of the ashes,” Speirs said. “Realizing that these are palms from previous years and that the palms we get this Palm Sunday will show up next year to be burned. It sort of brings things full circle.”
Fr. Moreno said he organized the event both for fun and as an opportunity to highlight Ash Wednesday, which begins the season of Lent.
“I do a catechetical minute before each homily and last week's was about palms and ashes and where they come from since we're about to head into Lent,” Fr. Moreno said. “We decided to burn them here after Mass because we have a huge amount of palms from earlier years and because we've encouraged people drop off their palms from previous years.”
Some bring in palms from last Lent each year. Others still have several years of palms.
“That's perfectly fine,” Fr. Moreno said. “You can keep them as long as you want.”
So long as they're treated with reverence and respect, Fr. Moreno added.
“You don't want to throw them away,” Fr. Moreno said. “That's the big thing. Because the palms are blessed, they become sacramentals. For anything blessed there are two ways to dispose of it. That's to bury or burn it.”
Parishioners may burn palms on their own or bring them to a parish to be burned.
Fr. Moreno characterized the burning event as a Lent bookend of sorts.
“We distribute palms at the end of Lent and have ashes at the beginning,” Fr. Moreno said. “So that connection between the palms and ashes works to show us where we're going through our pilgrim journey of Lent.
“As we start Lent, we receive ashes from the palms of the previous year. So our destination is already in sight.”
Fr. Moreno chuckled when asked if the ashes derived from the burning would be enough to cover St. Michael's Ash Wednesday services.
“A little bit of ashes go pretty doggone far,” Fr. Moreno said. “We had at least a few years of collected palm. I think we could probably supply ashes for the whole deanery with what we got today.”
Deacon Jack Gardner of Prosper's St. Martin de Porres Parish quipped that they often see more attendance on Ash Wednesday than on actual holy days of obligation.
“We have an ashes service at 6 a.m. that day, then three Masses where we distribute ashes,” Dcn. Gardner said. “They're always heavily attended. People get into it.”
Although Ash Wednesday is not a holy day of obligation, it's a day all Catholics should participate in, Dcn. Gardner added.
“Because it's a physical way we can honor God by calling to mind our mortality as the season of Lent begins,” Dcn. Gardner said.
Dcn. Gardner explained the minister says either, “Remember that you are dust and to dust you shall return” or “Repent and believe in the Gospel” as they apply ashes to parishioners' foreheads.
“Those are very powerful words,” Dcn. Gardner said. “So the physical act and image of having ashes placed on your forehead helps bring that to mind. Then you carry the mark, the ashes, around with you all day, which makes you aware you're Catholic.”
It's in that regard a fun, communal, but profound experience, Dcn. Gardner said of Ash Wednesday.