It is traditional during the Catholic period of lent to give up something you like, chocolate or wine for example.
Pope Francis has gone one step further and asked people to stop being mean to each other online.
Lent, which started on February 26, and ends just before Easter is an important fixture in the Christian calendar with some observing strict fasting over the six weeks. Other people just give up the one thing.
Pope Francis said in an Ash Wednesday speech at the Vatican people had become too used to insulting each other.
"We live in an atmosphere polluted by too much verbal violence, too many offensive and harmful words, which are amplified by the internet," he said.
"Today, people insult each other as if they were saying 'Good Day.'"
The pope is no stranger to being trolled online with a number of anti-pope Twitter accounts in operation.
Francis has also been the butt of criticism from a small but powerful number of American conservatives unhappy with his stands on various theological issues as well as social matters from immigration to climate change.
Their spiritual guru is American cardinal Raymond Leo Burke, who stepped up attacks on Francis after the pontiff demoted him from a senior Vatican post several years ago.
Burke often appears on Catholic conservative media such as the EWTN religious television network, and his speeches are often published in full by sites such as the National Catholic Register, Catholic News Agency and LifeSite News.
For years, Burke enjoyed an anti-Francis alliance with Steve Bannon, but broke with the former Trump White House strategist in June after Bannon said he wanted to make a film version of a sensationalist book about alleged homosexuality in the Vatican.
