Wearing Ashes to Class

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Mark 8:38 Douay-Rheims 1899

For he that shall be ashamed of me, and of my words, in this adulterous and sinful generation: the Son of man also will be ashamed of him, when he shall come in the glory of his Father with the holy angels.

1 Peter 4:16 Douay-Rheims 1899

But if as a Christian, let him not be ashamed, but let him glorify God in that name.

Experience? Yea, I’ve been guilt of being embarrassed of my faith, mostly due to lack thereof.

Advice? Pray, hold your head up and be a warrior of Christ!
 
@Catholic2018 and @Jen95 (and others?),

In order to discern the right course in one’s particular circumstances, I suggest going back to basics, i.e., the Commandment to love God and neighbor. Wearing ashes could be an expression of love for both God and neighbor.

If you have a confident attitude and regard others’ remarks and questions as opportunities to love them and share God’s love, then go for it!

On the other hand, if it causes you to be overly anxious or self-absorbed, or annoyed with others, or if it brings out bad behavior in others, in other words, if it generates too much non-love, then perhaps you shouldn’t.

In the workplace, avoid making it an expression or assertion of power, or of liberty when it is conflated with power. If you can keep your focus on love and service, and leave open a path to love and service, then do it!

If it would alienate your employer or lose your job, then perhaps you shouldn’t. Evangelization is a process, and it’s easier to evangelize in the workplace when you still work there.
 
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Margaret_Ann said:
The ashes are from burned blessed palms for Palm Sunday of the previous year.
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Yes, I knew that but the school kids did not. I was just sort of amazed that their first thought was human remains. They must not have bbq pits, fireplaces, or campfires in their lives.
 
A coworker emailed our HR director a couple of months ago about it.
She said that they’re in the middle of reviewing their policies. Nothing since then.
Our administration has to know this. Wouldn’t it be obvious to someone with HR training that that is illegal?

Example 12 here literally covers Ash Wednesday, and a Catholic wearing a crucifix:

https://www.eeoc.gov/eeoc/publications/qa_religious_garb_grooming.cfm
 
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DisorientingSneeze said:
Then as a public school teacher I ended up explaining it a lot. I thought my brief explanation was just about covering it until one year when a kid asked me, “but whose ashes are they?” I wondered how many kids thought it was human remains. So I adjusted my explanation after that.
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Well, if it was a Catholic student who was puzzling over what exactly was meant by “remember you are dust, and to dust you shall return”…

People come to strange conclusions when they reason things out for themselves.
 
Jen95 said:
A coworker emailed our HR director a couple of months ago about it.
She said that they’re in the middle of reviewing their policies. Nothing since then.
Our administration has to know this. Wouldn’t it be obvious to someone with HR training that that is illegal?

Example 12 here literally covers Ash Wednesday, and a Catholic wearing a crucifix:

Religious Garb and Grooming in the Workplace: Rights and Responsibilities | U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission
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Which is to say you could wear the ashes and, if you are asked to remove them you could say: “I’m sorry, I thought you had been made aware of the EEOC ruling on ashes. Accomodation is not an undue hardship in my situation. Would you like me to send you a link to the website? I know you have to have a good reason to make exceptions and be able to defend them as legally necessary, so I’d be happy to send that to you.”

We aren’t out to be "“problem children,” after all. Present this as “I realize you have a job to do; I can show you how you justify that you have to make this accomodation in my case.” Even if you think they actually are anti-Catholic, you do better to presume that they’re only trying to do their jobs diligently.
 
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Thank you – that sounds like a very good way of explaining that.
Am I being overly critical to think that it is wrong of the employer to broadly state “no religious expression allowed”, and to train all new staff on that?
To me that is the larger issue here.
 
Jen95 said:
Thank you – that sounds like a very good way of explaining that.
Am I being overly critical to think that it is wrong of the employer to broadly state “no religious expression allowed”, and to train all new staff on that?
To me that is the larger issue here.
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I think it depends on when you have an opportunity to speak up. When someone says “no expression” you can say, “well, not to correct you, but…not no expression. The EEOC doesn’t allow employers in the situation of our organization to take it quite that far. Employees do have rights, and the general public can appreciate that the organization can’'t infringe on that without committing a discrimination violation.”
 
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You have a great way of expressing yourself!
Thank you!
 
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