I have always considered Lent a “Catholic thing,” and never really gave it a lot of thought. Granted, the year my best friend gave up chocolate for Lent, I gathered up a box full of German, Belgian, and English chocolates and mailed it to her. Yes, that was wrong of me, and sadly that is the most I ever thought about Lent. Until today.
My Facebooking has dwindeled some in the last few days because our dsl modem keeps going crazy and rebooting itself for several hours at a time over the last couple of weeks. The duration of downtime keeps getting longer, and guess who doesn’t want to call Windstream and go through the “Is it plugged in” questioning. Techies don’t make good tech support customers. But I digress. So anyway, this morning I noticed a link posted on FB by a friend from church regarding her giving up Facebook for Lent. First I’m thinking, “Since when do Baptists do Lent?” But after reading the article, I felt the desire to observe Lent myself.
I have learned more about Lent today than I ever have in my life. Now, it’s not like I haven’t fasted before. I went on a 30 day media fast, which showed me how much time I was wasting on FB games (particularly after I broke the fast and starting FB gaming again). I did a 24 hour (voluntary) food fast once. I promised Chad I would do a 30 hour one like the youth did. 40 days is going to take a lot more self-control than I think I have.
So what am I giving up, besides Facebook? Going out to eat for lunch. That’s about $30 a week to give to The Forsaken Children. New books. I know there will be several I will decide I want, but I can always hit the church library, and even the pastor’s library. Given that I have 4 unread books, and 1 actively reading (technically 3, but 2 are 1 chapter per day readings that’s only 1-3 pages), I think that might get me through Lent. Hmm, that doesn’t really sound like a sacrifice does it? I suppose I should up that ante and keep a list of books I want to get, and donate the price of them to the Forsaken Children also.
I could never give anything up that I enjoy doing or eating, or drinking. Speaking of drinking, where did I put that beer?
Well it certainly isn’t easy. That day alone I had more posts from people on FB that needed a response. But except for the books, I needed a fast from the other stuff. I notice I forgot to list sodas and games.
Oh, and calling tech support is something I really dislike also. Especially when you tell them “I did that already”
Exactly! But on the other hand, having been on the tech support side, I don’t want to be a jerk either. I know 99% of them don’t want to be tier 1 support anyway.
I’m so selfish. Didn’t give anything up.
I almost broke the lunch fast today. And I broke the FB fast long enough to grab a prom pic. LOL Oh, and I had part of a dr pepper Sat. *fail*
You certainly don’t need to be Catholic to celebrate lent, at least in spirit, and in my book, you have the right idea. The main purpose is to give up something so that you either have more money to use doing God’s work, or giving up something time-wise so you have more time to spend in prayer, reading the Bible, etc. Giving up food, especially junk food, is something many Catholics do each year for Lent, and it’s a good thing, especially if you really do replace the junk with good nutritious food.
The point isn’t the giving up of something, but rather more time spent getting closer to God. We give up to gain, and to give to others.
🙂
That’s really how I am looking at it. Not so much giving up as refocusing. 🙂