On Wednesday Christians around the world took part in Ash Wednesday services as part of the beginning of the season of Lent (for those of us in liturgical denominations). Although it’s commonly associated only with Catholics, lots of other Christian denominations give out ashes, too–I got mine at my Episcopal parish.

This year brought a new twist—the Muslim month of Ramadan also began. Now you might think that it’s kind of interesting that the Christian season of self-denial and penance and the Muslim month for prayer will run parallel this year and that’s because you’re a normal person. But if you’re an American right wing Christian the colocation of the seasons is a catalyst for racism.

I’ve written about the general and sometimes deliberate unhappiness of right wing Christians before but I was really surprised to see how much worse they were on Wednesday. Here’s a sampling of their racist and anti-Muslim crap.

I have been a Christian all my life, and an observant Catholic or Episcopalian for a good part of it, and for the life of me I cannot figure out how Ash Wednesday—a day of fasting, prayer, and sacrifice—can be celebrated a la Chinese New Year. Or how it can in any way be compared to the structure of Ramadan, where daily fasting and prayer stop every day at sunset and then food, drink, and community are celebrated. But when you’re a persecuted US Christian, it’s logical.

I looked and this is all I could find about Ramadan at City Hall:

But this Ramadan is likely to look very different for Mr. Mamdani, coming against the backdrop of a jam-packed City Hall schedule and the exhausting everyday demands of leading the nation’s largest city.

In the early days of the month, he will host iftar dinners with firefighters, delivery drivers and other working Muslims in the city, part of a strategy to focus on the service projects and community outreach that define the principles of Ramadan, his senior aide Zara Rahim said.

Mr. Mamdani will fast while giving speeches, traveling across the city and greeting constituents without so much as a snack or a sip of water. He will break his fast at a handful of his favorite local restaurants throughout the weeks, and his office will support meal distribution efforts that some mosques with large migrant populations are leading, Ms. Rahim said.

The mayor will also incorporate much of his campaign’s Ramadan strategy into his daily governing style. He is expected to film a few Ramadan-related videos, and his team is planning specific outreach to the city’s West African, South Asian, Middle Eastern and Black American Muslim communities in an effort to showcase the diverse backgrounds of the city’s Muslims.

I’m pretty adamant about the non-establishment clause and I can’t see the problem.

Well, I guess I can—the people complaining are performative Christians, the ones who are on social media with their pious Sunday posts about Jesus while during the rest of the week they advocate to inflict as much pain as possible on the people Jesus told them to care about. You also might not remember this much fake Christian caterwauling last year when Lent and Ramadan overlapped. That’s because last year there wasn’t a big fake uproar over it. But as anti-Muslim hate is on the rise around the world, now the bad actors on social media are running with this fake ersatz outrage.

And the way you absolutely know it’s about performative Christianity is that the actual religious holiday that would be acknowledged is Easter, and Easter is ubiquitous here in the US. Ash Wednesday is a low key day and attendance at a service is optional, even in the Catholic church which designates days outside of Sunday as days of obligation.

This sums up my view about the whole thing:

lent and ramadan kicking off on the same day

— tyler huckabutt (@tylerhuckabee.bsky.social) 2026-02-18T16:10:10.533Z

I’ll leave you with this: