The Pope won’t be traveling for Ash Wednesday

For decades, John Paul would open the Catholic church’s solemn Lenten period with a ceremony in St. Sabina’s Basilica, a 5th-century church on Rome’s Aventine Hill. During the service, the pontiff would smudge ashes, a sign of penitence, on the foreheads of clergy and lay people.

But the Vatican said that this year the afternoon ceremony won’t be held.

Instead, the pope will preside over a prayer ceremony, which will include a blessing and smudging of the ashes on the faithful in a Vatican auditorium the morning of Ash Wednesday, Feb. 25.