Valentine’s Day is Ash Wednesday. Can I have chocolate? Fayetteville minister weighs in

Ash Wednesday and Valentine’s Day fall on the same day this year — Feb. 14, 2024, i.e. today.

The occurrence is rare or not terribly rare, depending on how you define the word. On the one hand, the days were the same just in 2018, and will be the same day again in 2029.

More: Pitts: Fayetteville pastors offer ashes at a meal for the homeless. Things to know about Lent.

On the other hand, after 2029, they will not fall on the same day the rest of the century. And before 2018, the last day they were the same day was 1945.

At first glance, the two events seem odd bedfellows to be sharing the same day.

Jesus figurines and chocolate. Ash Wednesday and Valentine’s Day fall on the same day, Feb. 14, 2024.

A solemn time vs. a time of big spending

Ash Wednesday, a big day on the Christian calendar, is a solemn time where the faithful are called to remember their own mortality — as symbolized by the marking of the cross in ash on their foreheads. It is a time where some Christians go without something they enjoy — like for example, chocolates. It is a sacrifice for the season of Lent, which starts with Ash Wednesday and ends the Thursday before Easter, which is March 31 this year.

More: Pitts/’A broken world’: Fayetteville church taps prayer partners after racist, obscene vandalism

Valentine’s Day of course is about romantic love — and often Hallmark and flowers and fancy dinners and candies and such. Last year, Americans spent nearly $26 billion they were so smitten in 2023, according to National Retail Federation figures.

Some memes on social media have had fun with the incidental timing of Ash Wednesday and Valentine’s Day. These have been especially attractive to churches, whose members see an opportunity to attract interest from a nation increasingly turning away from regular church membership. A popular one depicts candy hearts with messages like, “U R dust” or “Dust to Dust.”

How about sweets?

Memes aside, one could easily be tempted to put Valentine’s Day and Ash Wednesday on opposite poles, a case of indulgence vs. denial.

Ash Wednesday and Valentine’s Day fall on the same day, Feb. 14, 2024. Memes that play up the connection have appeared on social media, particularly for United Methodist Churches.

But that seems too pat.

So what do they have in common?

And if someone is giving up sweets for Lent can they have chocolate on Ash Wednesday? A lot of people have asked, and who can blame them?

The Rev. Jaye White said via text: “Deep questions!

“As has been said, you can’t spell VaLENTine without Lent!” she wrote, citing a meme she saw from the Illinois Conference of the United Methodist Church.

What ties it all together

White says love ties it all together.

“Well, we remember our mortality,” she said. “We also remember God, who created us out of dust, who loves us so much that his son carried that cross. He turned his face toward Jerusalem, knowing what was coming. While we are remembering his forty day fast in the wilderness and his voluntary sacrifice, we are also celebrating the love that it took to do that.”

White is Director of Outreach Ministries for the North Carolina Conference of the United Methodist Church, which represents churches in the eastern part of the state.  She is scheduled to give the Ash Wednesday message at 6 p.m. in the historic Wesley Chapel at Camp Ground United Methodist Church. She regularly attends the church at 4625 Campground Road, where the Rev. Sarah Smith Pitts, wife of the author, is associate pastor and the senior pastor is the Rev. Bobby Tyson.

On the subject of love, White continues: “We profess that God is love, and that God so loved the world… not to condemn the world but to save it.”

She concludes: “Eat the chocolate.”

Opinion Editor Myron B. Pitts can be reached at mpitts@fayobserver.com or 910-486-3559.

This article originally appeared on The Fayetteville Observer: Love and chocolate: Fayetteville minister talks Ash Wednesday, Valentine’s Day