Episcopal priests and lay people from Beverly, New York, Newark, Baltimore, Chicago, St. Louis, San Francisco, Seattle, and other cities around the country marked foreheads with the sign of the cross at train stations, subway stops, coffee shops, and street corners.
Yesterday afternoon, Bishop M. Thomas Shaw offered ashes to pedestrians in Downtown Boston yesterday afternoon, said a spokeswoman for the Episcopal Diocese of Massachusetts. And St. James Episcopal Church in Amesbury offered a similar service to about 35 people outside its church, according to its rector, the Rev. Susan Esco Chandler.
But the efforts to reach outside the confines of a church were especially unusual in Beverly, where Saint Peter’s took to the train platform. In all, about 35 commuters stopped for the brief prayer between 5:30 and 8:30 a.m., said Godfrey Perrott, Saint Peter’s treasurer and one of eight lay Eucharistic ministers at the church.
“We think there is an unmet desire for people to get ashes on Ash Wednesday that cannot make it to a regular service because it’s a workday,’’ Perrott said. “We thought going to a train station and offering ‘Ashes to Go’ will meet that need.’’
Members of the Beverly church said they did not proselytize from the platform, but some commuters said they were uncomfortable.
Yesterday, an MBTA spokesman said the agency will study its policies regarding religious groups on train platforms.
“I think it’s a little strange, to tell you the truth,’’ said Andy Kirch, 31, of Beverly, after declining the prayer. “It kind of . . . takes the ritual out of it. It’s a little strange, doing fast-food religion. But if people want to do it, that’s great.’’
The Ashes to Go program was started by a church in Missouri in 2007 and picked up by a congregation in Chicago two years go. Saint Peter’s rector, the Rev. Manuel P. Faria III, said he was not sold on the idea initially.
