Lent focuses us on three primary elements – prayer, fasting and almsgiving, or charity. Week one has a focus on fasting, and in particular, our spirit of fasting. Listen to God speaking in Friday’s reading from Isaiah 58…
“Is not this the fast that I choose: to loose the bonds of wickedness, to undo the thongs of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free, and to break every yoke?
Is it not to share your bread with the hungry, and bring the homeless poor into your house; when you see the naked, to cover him, and not to hide yourself from your own flesh?
Then shall your light break forth like the dawn, and your healing shall spring up speedily; your righteousness shall go before you, the glory of the LORD shall be your rear guard.
Then you shall call, and the LORD will answer; you shall cry, and he will say, Here I am.”
Why do we fast? I’ll never forget an evangelical friend of mine going through RCIA and being introduced to the idea of fasting. He quickly realized, “I am really good to myself.”
In our culture, we rarely think of deny ourselves anything. And yet it’s probably more now important with so much available to us. Jesus asks us to take on his sacrificial nature, and fasting helps us exercise and develop that faculty.
Let’s pray – Father of grace and mercy, help the spirit of our fasting by uniting our hearts to the sacred heart of Jesus and His sacrificial love. Amen.
#lent #fasting