Each year, the Gospel for Ash Wednesday sets out three practices – prayer, fasting and almsgiving – which we are called to perform with greater intensity and intentionality during Lent. Like a three-legged stool, all three of these practices are necessary for a stable Christian life and so, we are called to focus on them, once again, during this Lenten Season as we renew our commitment to following our Lord through his death to his Resurrection. As we approach the halfway mark for Lent, allow me to offer some reflections and encouragement on these practices
We all know the importance of prayer since that draws us ever closer into an intimate relationship with God. Our ultimate goal is eternal communion with God. Through prayer, we anticipate the beatific vision as we commune with God while still on earth. Yet, our very busy lives often seem to get in the way of our prayer lives. I like to compare it to our awareness of the importance of saving for our retirement. We all know how important that is but often fail to act on it and find ourselves unprepared when retirement approaches. Death leads to our eternal retirement and we need to make sure we act to prepare for it. During the Lenten Season, we are called back to prayer through daily Mass attendance, reading and reflecting on Sacred Scripture, recitation of the rosary or spending more time in prayerful conversation with God. Maybe you made a resolution at the beginning of Lent to improve your prayer life. I commend you if you have been faithful to your resolution and encourage you to resume your resolution if you haven’t; you still have more than half of this Lenten Season to draw closer to God in preparation for Easter!
As we become aware of the many gifts God has given us, we realize that our gifts are intended to be shared; we do that through almsgiving. There are many ways to give alms: the annual Catholic Charities Appeal, Catholic Relief Services, the Pontifical Mission Societies and our monthly Feed the Needy collection are just a few ways that you can give alms with an assurance that your gift will be well used. Again, I commend you if you have been generous in your almsgiving this Lent and encourage you to make your contribution to your favorite charity if you haven’t yet done so.
The one practice that many struggle to understand and embrace is fasting. Allow me to offer some reflections on this very important aspect of Lent. Fasting is so easily misunderstood or dismissed altogether. And yet, this is the only one of the three practices that the prophet Joel mentions explicitly in the first reading on Ash Wednesday. In the Gospel, Jesus likewise speaks to his disciples about fasting: “When you fast, he says, do not look gloomy like the hypocrites.” “When you fast,” Jesus says. Notice he does not say, “if you fast,” nor does he say, “if you feel like fasting …” Fasting is not reserved for monks of centuries long ago. It is not for an imaginary Christian elite. The call to fast is addressed to each of us.
The “why” of our fasting begins with the readings we heard on Ash Wednesday and on the First Sunday of Lent. As Ash Wednesday’s Gospel indicated, Jesus, who is God incarnate, wanted his disciples to fast. And on the First Sunday of Lent, we read the account of Jesus fasting for 40 days. Therefore, not only does God ask us, his disciples, to fast; he fasted himself. God’s counsel and his example offer us reason enough to fast. But what good does God see in fasting? According to Saint Thomas Aquinas, fasting “is practiced for a threefold purpose.” First: to curb our desires for physical pleasures. Second: in order that our minds “may arise more freely to the contemplation of heavenly things.” Third: “in order to satisfy for sins.”
Curbing our desire for physical pleasures is self-explanatory. As we say “no” to our physical appetites for good, God-given things such as food and drink we can turn our physical hunger into a spiritual yearning that only God can satisfy.
The second purpose, which stems from the first, is to free the mind for the contemplation of heavenly things. When we stop giving in to all our physical desires, they gradually stop clamoring within us. Our minds take on a new clarity and our hearts learn to long for that which is truly good and lasting: God. Fasting thus enables us to lift our minds and hearts more easily to God in prayer.
Finally, we fast in order to “satisfy for sins.” In union with Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross, we can offer the little inconveniences of fasting to God in reparation for the times we have offended him.
The Church does not require much of us during Lent: two days of fasting (on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday) on which we may eat one meal and two smaller snacks which, together, do not equal one full meal; and abstinence from meat today and every Friday. But, we are encouraged to fast throughout the Lenten Season and we will benefit from it for all three of these reasons. If we long for God and want to speak with ease and familiarity to God and listen to his voice in prayer, if we wish to show him a sign of our sorrow for our sins, then we ought to try fasting. If we enter into it prudently and prayerfully, we will be assured a fruitful Lent.
All of our Lenten sacrifices – prayer, fasting and almsgiving – redirect us to focus on God and his call, through his son, Jesus, to offer ourselves as a sacrifice – that is, a sacred action – before God. As we do this, we prepare for the Easter Triduum when we, once again, celebrate our share in Christ’s victory over sin and death and his glorious Resurrection. I pray that the remainder of this Lenten Season will find you drawing ever closer to God and even more prepared to join in the glory of the Cross and the joy of the Easter!