Rash Wednesday as Massgoers suffer burns
A Lenten Mass at a city church turned into ‘Rash Wednesday’ for dozens of worshippers who had caustic ash smeared on their foreheads.
Some parishioners at 10am Mass in the Church of the Sacred Heart on Seamus Quirke Road suffered burns and blistering after ash was smeared from a cork onto the foreheads. The church was three-quarters full at the time.
It transpired that the burnt palm leaves – which were blessed on Palm Sunday last year – turned caustic because they were so dry.
After several people complained of burning and blistering, Monsignor Malachy Hallinan immediately contacted the HSE’s Public Analyst Laboratory in Galway.
He was told by Executive Chemist Dr Andrew Flanagan that the problem arose because the leaves were particularly dry, and then turned caustic when holy water – which contains chlorine – was applied.
“I had the palm from Palm Sunday last year, it was stored in my garage and perfectly dry and seasoned. In my 48 years making it, I thought it was the nicest ashes I ever had, it was like powder,” said Msgr Hallinan.
He explained that he spent the weekend cutting up the leaves, and burned them in the stove in his sittingroom, before adding water on Shrove Tuesday.
“I had a sample to Dr Flanagan by 11.30am, and confirmed that it was perfectly dry and seasoned. He said that was my misfortune,” he said.
He was told that once he burned the palm, he removed all the carbon and when he applied water, they became caustic.
For more on this story, see the Galway City Tribune.