During Lent Station Masses will take place in various churches across the city of Aberdeen.
They will occur each Friday until the 31st of March. The evening begins with confessions from 18:00, then at 18:30 Stations of the Cross, followed by Mass at 19:00.
Our Stations for this Lent are:
- Friday 24 February: St. Mary’s Cathedral, Aberdeen
- Friday 3 March: Sacred Heart, Torry
- Friday 10 March: St Columba’s, Bridge of Don
- Friday 17 March: St Peter’s, Castlegate
- Friday 24 March: St Francis’, Mannofield
- Friday 31 March: St. Joseph’s, Woodside
The “Station Mass” belongs to the ancient History of the Church. These Masses likely began as a daily pilgrimage in the footsteps of the martyrs and saints of Rome, the people would then gather at the stopping place, the statio, or Station Church where Mass was to be celebrated. They were already a practice by the 4th Century. It was Pope St Gregory the Great (A.D. 590 – 604) who formalised and regulated the practice.
In recent decades this ancient Lenten tradition has been revived at Rome and elsewhere throughout the Catholic World.