Remember the smudges on the foreheads of so many people on the streets of Manhattan back on Ash Wednesday? I don’t think I’ve ever seen so many “Ashes-to-Go” stations out on the streets and corners of the city before. (One woman stopped me on a street in front of a church in the West Village which hadn’t opened yet and asked if I knew where she could get ashes. Luckily, I had just passed one such “ashes-to-go” station close by and was able to direct her to the corner of West 13th Street and Seventh Avenue to receive her annual reminder “that [we] are dust and unto dust shall [we] return.”)

How many promises to foster better habits and resolutions to give up something detrimental have fallen by the wayside now that we are approaching the mid-point of Lent? One custom associated with mid-Lent that will surprise most North Americans is that the Sunday which marks mid-Lent (this year it’s March 15) was traditionally treated like “Mother’s Day” in medieval Europe — and still is in the UK! On this mid-Lent Sunday, grown children would be expected to visit with and give roses to their mothers. (In connection with this, the Pope would often send a golden rose to a monarch who had been especially supportive of the Church during the past year. Henry VIII received such a golden rose, shortly before his break with the papacy over his divorce of Catherine of Aragon.)

The liturgical texts for this Sunday spoke of the heavenly Jerusalem as the mother of all believers. Fasting and ascetic disciplines were relaxed on this day and rose-colored vestments were worn instead of the purple vestments worn on the other days of Lent. Following this brief “vacation” from Lent, the festivity of this “Mothering Sunday,” fasting and discipline could be taken up again. It was an opportunity to try again at keeping lenten resolutions that had perhaps already fallen by the wayside.

It’s still a good day to get back to whatever good intentions we may have started Lent with — giving up a bad habit, exercising more self-control over a problematic area of our lives — as well follow J.K. Simmons’ advice at this year’s Oscars ceremony: “Call your mom, call your dad. If you’re lucky enough to have a parent or two alive on this planet, call ‘em. Don’t text. Don’t email. Call them on the phone. Tell ‘em you love ‘em, and thank them, and listen to them for as long as they want to talk to you.”