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MANDEVILLE, La. — Father Doug Busch is busy.

So is his colleague Father Mark Lomax.

They got the tip.

The Q-tip.

The Q-tips.

About 3,000 of them.

That’s why they’re counting them out for Ash Wednesday.

WGNO’s Bill Wood is with the priests at Our Lady of the Lake Catholic Church where Ash Wednesday has never looked like this.

With the pandemic, the priests are doing what they can to make not just sacred, but safe.

So they’re applying ashes, in the shape of the cross, on the tip of a Q-tip.

The ashes will arrive at four masses on Ash Wednesday.

Of course, Ash Wednesday is the traditional start of Lent.

Easter will arrive after 40 days and 40 nights and a Q-tip as an instrument of God’s grace.