London, March 8, 2025: The England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) has issued an apology after a social media post made light of a message from Pope Francis regarding Ash Wednesday.
The 88-year-old Pope, who has been receiving treatment for double pneumonia at Rome’s Gemelli hospital since February, posted a reflective message on his X account to mark the beginning of Lent.
His post read: “The Ashes remind us of who we are, which does us good. It puts us in our place, smooths out the rough edges of our narcissism, brings us back to reality, and makes us humbler and more open to one another.
“None of us is God; we are all on a journey.”
In response, the official England Cricket account replied: “Even @Pontifex loves The Ashes,” referencing the historic cricket rivalry between England and Australia.
One X user referred to the joke as “vile,” while another seemed to see the humorous side, saying: “no one can have a laugh anymore.”
The post was swiftly deleted following the backlash.
According to the BBC, an ECB spokesperson said: “This was an ill-judged post and was swiftly removed. We apologise for any offence caused.”
The Ashes is a men’s Test cricket series played biennially between England and Australia. The term originated in a satirical obituary published in a British newspaper, The Sporting Times, immediately after Australia’s 1882 victory at The Oval, its first Test win on English soil. The obituary stated that English cricket had died, and that “the body will be cremated and the ashes taken to Australia.”
The mythical ashes immediately became associated with the 1882–1883 series played in Australia, before which the English captain Ivo Bligh had vowed to “regain those ashes.” The English media therefore dubbed the tour the quest to regain the Ashes.
After England won two of the three Tests on the tour, a small urn was presented to Bligh in Melbourne. The contents of the urn are reputed to be the ashes of a wooden bail, and were humorously described as “the ashes of Australian cricket.” It is not clear whether that “tiny silver urn” is the same as the small terracotta urn given to Marylebone Cricket Club by Bligh’s widow after his death in 1927.
Source: premierchristian.news