Lenten Fasting

I recently got into a conversation that found me defending Lenten observance to a fellow Catholic.

Let me back up and clarify what is meant by "Catholic." The way I see it, Catholicism is both a pastime and a paradigm. Unlike some other forms of Christianity (and excepting the case of the convert), you’re born into Catholicism. So in the paradigm sense, either you is or you ain’t. In the pastime sense, I suppose, we need those modifiers like "lapsed" or "raised" or "practicing" to give others some sense of how into the whole deal we are.

I think our culture of indulgence has left little room for religious sacrifice. Americans like the idea of a God of Abundance and Plenty. If God loves us, the reasoning goes, why would He want us to cause ourselves to suffer? What could He possibly get out of it? The very word “sacrifice” conjures images of superstitious, cruel pagan murder rituals of the distant past. This was basically the anti-Lenten argument presented to me the other night: "Jesus doesn’t care if I give something up for Lent."

It seems unlikely to me that every major religion would include elements of sacrifice, fasting, deprivation, etc. unless these experiences had some sort of religious benefit. Now, I’m no theologian, but I present here my own personal take on the subject at this point in my lifelong spiritual journey (there’s that Catholic paradigm again): sacrifice isn’t something you do for God; rather, it’s something you do for yourself in the name of God.

In the case of Lenten observance, this amounts to establishing a reminder of sorts for oneself. I gave up fried food. Now, many times throughout the day, when I would normally have simply eaten something delicious, I must content myself instead with a brief moment of spiritual/religious awareness. The moment of spiritual/religious awareness is possible only because my sacrifice is performed in the name of God. If I were doing it for myself, I’d be dieting. My god would be my own health, or vanity, or self-loathing, or whatever other reason people have for dieting. My moment would be an awareness of my own ego. If I thought that would make me better off, I would do that.

When you discipline your desires, when you deprive yourself of something, it’s often followed by the realization that you don’t even need that thing and can get along perfectly fine without it. As a consequence, what you’re left with in the sacrificed object’s place (i.e., a moment of awareness) calls attention to the substitution and thereby further reinforces your faith in the thing you’re sacrificing for. Sacrifice in the name of the Lord strengthens our faith in Him. Isn’t that what you want?

If so, I wish you all a very solemn Lenten season.