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What Are You "Giving Up" For Lent?

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24 February 2010 - 12:31am — jpriest

Let’s go beyond the basics here and go straight to the heart: what do I need to let go of in order to grow closer to God?

Fasting
In his Lenten Message Pope Benedict writes, “Since all of us are weighed down by sin and its consequences, fasting is proposed to us as an instrument to restore friendship with God.”
Indeed, fasting has been a part of human life from the very beginning when God told Adam, “You may freely eat of every tree of the garden; but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall die” (Gen. 2:16-17). So it was, writes St. Basil, that “‘fasting was ordained in Paradise’ ‘You shall not eat is a law of fasting and abstinence’” (Benedict XVI, Lenten Message).
 
 “True fasting” is oriented toward doing “the will of the Heavenly Father, who ‘sees in secret, and will reward you’ (Mt. 6:18)…The true fast is thus directed to eating the ‘true food,’ which is to do the Father’s will (cf. Jn. 4:34). If, therefore, Adam disobeyed the Lord’s command ‘of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat,’ the believer, through fasting, intends to submit himself humbly to God, trusting in His goodness and mercy.”
 
“That We Might No Live NO Longer for Ourselves but for Him”

“Denying material food, which nourishes our body, nurtures an interior disposition to listen to Christ and be fed by His saving word. Through fasting and praying, we allow Him to come and satisfy the deepest hunger that we experience in the depths of our being: the hunger and thirst for God.”

Fasting for Others

Benedict tells us that “Voluntary fasting enables us to grown in the spirit of the Good Samaritan, who bends low and goes to the help of this suffering brother…By freely embracing an act of self-denial for the sake of another, we make a statement that our brother or sister in need is not a stranger. It is precisely to keep alive this welcoming and attentive attitude towards our brother and sisters that I encourage the parishes and every other community to intensify in Lent the custom of private and communal fasts, joined to the reading of the Word of God, prayer and almsgiving.” Benedict quotes St. Peter Chrysologogus: “Fasting is the soul of prayer, mercy is the lifeblood of fasting. So if you pray, fast; if you fast, show mercy’ if you want your petition to be heard, hear the petition of others. If you do not close your ear to other, you open God’s ear to yourself.”
 
Fasting: How?
How can I fast? Again we turn to the question we began with: what do I need to let go of in order to grow closer to God? If it’s wasting time on television or the internet or some such amusement, then give some of that time up every day to prayer, to reading the Bible or a spiritual book, to spending time with someone who needs you. If inviting God into the sphere of my bodily health is lacking, let go of something in order to give time to God in exercise. When we give these things up we discover that we never lose anything except that which we never really needed in the first place.
Lastly, pick a day per week and cut out some of the food you usually eat. Have a plan for Lent.