If fast food chains have drive-through service for people on the go, or those who do not have 15 minutes to sit down and eat a quick meal, the Advent Lutheran Church in Upper Arlington, Ohio, has a similar service on Ash Wednesday.

Instead of requiring the members of the church to sit down and attend services, which includes the placing of ashes on the forehead of the faithful - a yearly tradition among many Christian churches that signal the start of the 40-day Lenten season - the clergy applied ashes on the forehead of motorists who stopped in its parking lot, reports AP.

Like Us on Facebook

While the service, offered by the church for the first time, was criticized in social media, Rev. Aaron Layne from Advent Lutheran insisted it is bringing the church closer to people, who have shunned the church for years.

Critics of the practice say it cheapened the Lenten ritual.

Advent Lutheran is not the first Christian church in the U.S. to go out of its four walls in a bid to bring back members who have, over the years, stayed away for various reasons.

In 2007, the St. John's Episcopal Church in St. Louis, under its "Ashes to Go" movement, placed ashes on foreheads of passersby outside a café in Missouri. After eight years, the church has replicated the service in 30 states and several countries.

Other Christian churches offering the service outside the usual place where they do it are the St. Peter's Episcopal Church in Ahstabula, Ohio, which will place ashes on foreheads at a downtown park, and the Advent Evangelical Lutheran Church, also in Ohio.

Meanwhile, Pope Francis, in his Ash Wednesday homily delivered at the Basilica of St. Sabina on Aventine Hill in Rome, cited a passage from the prophet Joel calling on people to have inner conversion.

He described that conversion as "taking the path of a conversion that is neither superficial nor transient, but is a spiritual journey that reaches the deepest place of our self," quotes the Vatican Radio.

Tagsash wednesday, lenten season, Pope Francis