S01 Ep42 | Are You Ready for What This Lent is Preparing You For?

[@RGRGIS]

Like!

[@Peter-GG]

On the topic of fasting, I've become convinced that some of the decisions made in the 1960s to loosen the requirements for Catholics were a mistake (although many Eastern Catholics still fast etc. quite rigorously). At my security job several of my co-workers are Muslims, and for the entire month of Ramadan they all abstain from eating or drinking _anything_ between dawn and dusk (even water, and even when it falls in the middle of summer). If someone were trying to decide between Christianity and Islam, and compared their respective members' willingness to sacrifice, I'm afraid we wouldn't come off well. It seems that the rules were relaxed primarily to move away from any sense of legalism and put the emphasis more on the internal than the external, more on what our individual consciences move us to do. But this need not be an either/or -- rules need not imply coercion, compulsion, being "forced," or the like. If they're _good_ rules, they serve to _liberate_ our minds and wills, to raise them from apathy, so that it becomes easier for us to pursue what is good. And sustaining ascetic practices is certainly easier when we're supporting each other in this as a whole community than when we're primarily on our own. Obviously in Catholicism we've by no means lost this -- Lent is still Lent -- but I think there's room for renewal and revival in this area of Church life.

[@alimariehere]

Totally agree!! I think that’s where so much of the ecclesial vs natural fasting discussion has come from. I’ve noticed a lot of it this year!