Lent
The forty days the Church walks toward Easter
Lent 2027 begins on Wednesday, February 10, 2027 (Ash Wednesday) and ends on Thursday, March 25, 2027 (the Mass of the Lord’s Supper). Below: every key date for the season, what the Church asks of you, and the prayers that belong to it.
Lent 2027 — Key Dates
Lent Dates 2027–2035
The date moves each year because it is fixed to Easter, which is the first Sunday after the first full moon on or after the spring equinox.
| Year | Lent begins | Palm Sunday | Holy Thursday | Good Friday | Easter Sunday |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2027 | February 10, 2027 | March 21, 2027 | March 25, 2027 | March 26, 2027 | March 28, 2027 |
| 2028 | March 1, 2028 | April 9, 2028 | April 13, 2028 | April 14, 2028 | April 16, 2028 |
| 2029 | February 14, 2029 | March 25, 2029 | March 29, 2029 | March 30, 2029 | April 1, 2029 |
| 2030 | March 6, 2030 | April 14, 2030 | April 18, 2030 | April 19, 2030 | April 21, 2030 |
| 2031 | February 26, 2031 | April 6, 2031 | April 10, 2031 | April 11, 2031 | April 13, 2031 |
| 2032 | February 11, 2032 | March 21, 2032 | March 25, 2032 | March 26, 2032 | March 28, 2032 |
| 2033 | March 2, 2033 | April 10, 2033 | April 14, 2033 | April 15, 2033 | April 17, 2033 |
| 2034 | February 22, 2034 | April 2, 2034 | April 6, 2034 | April 7, 2034 | April 9, 2034 |
| 2035 | February 7, 2035 | March 18, 2035 | March 22, 2035 | March 23, 2035 | March 25, 2035 |
Counting the days? See how long until Easter — live, and free to embed on a parish site.
Still deciding what to give up? Twelve to choose from — each with a reason and what it actually costs, plus the two thirds of Lent the lists leave out.
Walking the Way of the Cross? All fourteen stations in order — with the prayers at each, and it prints as a booklet.
Giving something up is the easy half. The Litany of Humility — the prayer against the pride underneath it, in full.
The font by the door is refilled at the Vigil. What holy water is, and what it is not.
Going to confession this season? A full examination of conscience — by the Ten Commandments, and it prints on a plain sheet.
What Is Lent?
Lent is the forty-day season of preparation that leads the Church to Easter. It begins on Ash Wednesday and ends on the evening of Holy Thursday, when the Mass of the Lord’s Supper opens the Easter Triduum. The number forty is deliberate. It recalls the forty days Christ spent fasting in the desert before beginning his public ministry, and behind that the forty years Israel spent in the wilderness on the way to the promised land. If you count the days on a calendar you will get more than forty, and that is not a mistake. Sundays are not counted. Every Sunday of the year is a celebration of the Resurrection, so a Sunday is never a day of fasting, even inside Lent. The forty days are the weekdays and Saturdays from Ash Wednesday through Holy Saturday. The Church names three things as the work of the season: prayer, fasting, and almsgiving. They are meant to be done together rather than picked from. Prayer turns you toward God, fasting loosens the grip of what you want, and almsgiving turns you toward your neighbour. Take away any one of the three and the other two curdle: fasting on its own becomes a diet, and almsgiving on its own becomes accounting. The colour of the season is violet, the colour of penance and preparation. On the fourth Sunday, called Laetare Sunday, rose may be worn instead, a deliberate lightening halfway through to say that the season has an end and the end is joy. Lent is not sadness for its own sake. It is a clearing out, and what it clears space for arrives at Easter.
Observance & Rules
These are the rules of the Latin Church. Eastern Catholic Churches keep their own, older and generally stricter discipline. There are two days of both fasting and abstinence: Ash Wednesday and Good Friday. On those days Catholics who are bound eat one full meal, plus up to two smaller meals that together do not add up to a second full meal, and no meat. Every Friday of Lent is a day of abstinence from meat. Fasting binds those from their eighteenth birthday until their fifty-ninth. Abstinence from meat binds everyone from the age of fourteen onward. Illness, pregnancy, nursing, heavy physical work, and other serious reasons excuse a person, and no one is expected to damage their health to keep a discipline. If you are unsure whether something excuses you, ask your parish priest rather than guessing in either direction. The rules are a floor, not a ceiling. They mark the minimum the Church asks of everyone, and most people who keep Lent well add something of their own on top.
Practical Guide
The most common mistake is choosing something enormous on Ash Wednesday and abandoning it by the second week. Pick something small enough that you will still be doing it on Palm Sunday, and specific enough that you know each night whether you did it. Giving something up works best when the thing you give up was actually taking something from you. Cutting out a habit you barely have is a gesture. Cutting out the thing you reach for when you are bored or anxious is a Lent, because every time you reach and stop you are handed a small moment you did not have before, and that moment is what the season is for. Taking something on is the half people forget. A fixed ten minutes of prayer at the same hour each day will do more over forty days than an hour attempted whenever you feel moved. Daily Mass one extra weekday, a decade of the Rosary on the commute, the Stations of the Cross on a Friday, confession once during the season: any one of these, kept, is a real Lent. Almsgiving does not have to be money, though money is the cleanest form because it costs you something you cannot get back. Give what you would have spent on the thing you gave up. If it is not money, give time to a person who cannot repay you. And when you break it, and most people do, start again the same day rather than waiting for the next Sunday. The season is a training ground, not an examination.
Prayers for Lent
Scripture for This Season
Bible Verses About Forgiveness
Scripture on being forgiven by God and finding the grace to forgive others.
Bible Verses for Strength and Courage
Scripture for the moments that ask more of you than you think you have.
Bible Verses About Trust
Scripture for learning to lean on God rather than on your own understanding.
Where this falls in the year
- Within itAsh Wednesday
- Within itHoly Week
- EarlierThe EpiphanyJanuary 6, 2027
Frequently Asked Questions
Upcoming · Sep 23
St. Padre PioSee the full liturgical calendar — every feast this year, and an embed for your parish site.