Leo XIV will preside over this Ash Wednesday —the first of his pontificate— the traditional procession from the church of San Anselmo to the basilica of Santa Sabina, a gesture that in Rome marks the beginning of the Lenten season. With this celebration, the Pontiff personally resumes a practice that in recent years had been conditioned by the papal absence due to health problems.
The rite begins in San Anselmo, on the Aventine Hill, where the Pope and members of the Roman Curia gather to start a brief procession toward the nearby basilica of Santa Sabina. The route, just about 200 meters, is carried out while litanies and penitential chants are intoned.
An Ancient Tradition
The so-called statio is part of the ancient tradition of Rome’s stational churches. Already in the first centuries of Christianity, the bishop of Rome celebrated the Eucharist in different temples of the city during Lent, summoning the clergy and the faithful in a liturgical itinerary that prepared the community for Easter. Over time, this practice became structured within the Roman calendar.
The station of Ash Wednesday has been celebrated for centuries in the basilica of Santa Sabina, built in the 5th century on the Aventine Hill, and thus, with a sober ceremony laden with tradition, Rome begins the forty-day journey that will lead to the Paschal Triduum.