Page created 4 Mar 2004 by blvdgirl
URL: http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/09152a.htm
Lent. What do you think about it? What are you doing/not doing about/for it?
without meat... Well, I did forget last Friday and had two pieces of calimari before I remembered that calimari is meat... This is the hardest thing that I have ever given up for Lent, because the Southwest is not very vegetarian friendly (funny how I never noticed this before).
In the past, I've given up chocolate, desserts, soda, and speeding (that last comes highly recommended). Why do I give stuff up for Lent? It stands as a daily reminder to me about the sacrifices that Christ made to bring me salvation.
I gave it up about two weeks ago in preparation for getting my voice in shape, and then I thought, why don't I make this a lenten fast. Not because I feel like I have to, but because there is something valueable in self-denial, and I appreciate the "daily reminder" as you put it, amy. Although it's pretty piddly to think about giving up caffeine as a reminder of that.It is funny though, it was a lot easier until I made it an issue of faith. Once I decided to make it a lenten thing, I started to think about it all the time.
I don't do lent. Never have. But I ought to give up S'mores.
me and the wife both have gone ice cream free, unfortunately I should have given up all sweets because everything BUT ice cream has been put in front of me in the last few days, and so I am not missing it all that much. Maybe I'll do a retroactive sweets giving up. Chocolate is the hardest, but when you finally have it again after 40 days it is shear bliss!I think next year instead of giving something up I'll just do mission work for a year, or is that cheating because that's my plan anyway? :)
My "sacrifice" was to start working out again, which I'm not sure is in the right spirit. But it is something I haven't been enjoying lately and thought it was the least I could do. I don't have any foods or drink that I feel it would be tough for me to give up for a little over a month, so I was at a loss. One of my friends gave up ranch dressing and "jealousy," which I thought was a good idea. A less tangible sort of vice. I was doing okay with working out but for the last few days. I feel like someone clubbed me over the head lately, I am so tired and out of it. Everyone in my office is sick and my favorite student worker was just diagnosed with mono, so I'm really hoping that doesn't find its way into my system.Anyway, Hernando and I are going to start going to church two days a week starting tomorrow (7th day Adventist, Hernando's persuasion, on Saturday, then my style on Sundays). And I really am looking forward to it. So does that atone somewhat? (I still have the Catholic guilt thing going on per my childhood, I think. I would make my grandpa proud, God rest his soul).
of self-denial. i started early, being totally hooked on potato chips in high school, and suddenly was like, i'm not going to eat potato chips anymore. then i heard that soda completely disintegrated animal teeth, true or not, and gave up soda. i quit meat, but not much to do with self-denial. recently i weened myself off honey in my tea, and i've cut down on cheese about three-fold. i don't think any of these things are bad things to give up. i'd never, say, give up spinach or my green tea or garlic. i think it can be healthy to enforce these kind of things for yourself.
My problem would be choosing what to give up.
gave up chips this year. Meaning tortilla, potato, and otherwise. We go to Subway a lot and it's difficult to resist the many tempting varieties they have there. She says it's been tough. If I feel the need to eat chips, I try to eat them when she's not in her office. Which is right next to mine.Spinach and garlic and green tea are three things I had this weekend--I love spinach and try to eat it almost every day--and I think they are all really good for you. I'm driking green tea right now in hopes of a miraculous cure from this cold. With all of the bad things I put into my body, I couldn't imagine forsaking these good things.
in the line at whole foods last night I saw a copy of Living Without, and my memory was jogged and I remembered a wonderful This American Life episode. The Sarah Vowell piece on the magazine and the reading of the short story in Act IV were my favorite segments.
is great. Lukas, do you know what time and station it's on? I used to come across it on accident now and then but haven't seemed to lately. (sorry this has nothing to do with Lent).
i'm not sure, but i think this american life is on friday nights either seven or nine there.
the times. Refer to the Radio Preset Ratatouille entree (am I calling that the right name?). Thanks, though.
...while we were mixing the record (and driving home all night)... I guess I picked the wrong time to stop drinking coffee. Seriously though, I feel sorry, but not guilty or regretful. I'm back on the wagon now though. I had so much junk food over the weekend that today all I craved was rice and oatmeal. Today my head is pounding.
i shall abstain from cigarettes again.i did it quite succesfully last year, which also led to me cutting back the amount i drank quite considerably. however, while my habits were in the right place, my heart wasn't. i lit up at the stroke of midnite the evening before easter, and went on a bender because some friends and i were on the guest list for a private party at whiskey sky, causing me to sleep in easter morning until my sister called and woke me up informing me that she was waiting outside and why wasn't i ready and waiting, and i got dressed in a mad dash and hopped in the car without even taking my dog out for a walk, and sat through easter service and brunch with a brutal hangover.
everyone told me, "well, if you can quit for 40 days, you might as well just quit alltogether, right?" to which i snottily replied, "i am not quitting, i am abstaining. using lent as a way to quit smoking would almost be sacriligious. lent isn't meant to clear up personal problems, it is a holy event."
but with my 40 days ending in a hangover, instead of rejoicing, i think i need to re-evaluate this year.
I was feeling unoriginal this year and opted to give up soda again. So far, I haven't even desired a soda, so it has in no way been inconvenient... This goes against the whole daily reminder of sacrifice philosophy that my giving something up for lent is supposed to inspire... Alas.
As you all know, my life has been tough lately. And, in truth, I wasn't feeling very up for lent this year (haha- you say, lent isn't about feeling up).But, at my church's Ash Wednesday service I got stuck on the idea of Christ going to the desert and, truly wanting to see God in a new way this Lenten season, I prayed that God would lead me to the desert--I think that I was struck by the poetry of the idea and prayed it because I didn't know what to pray. But, as is often the case, God knew my real need and instead of bringing me to the desert he brought me to the mountain (both literally and metaphoically) to see him freshly transfigured and to fill me up so to speak (I took my youth group on a retreat this weekend). It is good to be reminded that God is in his world every second and that all is well.
That was just what I needed to hear.
Today's project: I'm trying to create a lenten study for my youth group around the idea of sacredness... How does one find/convey the sacred in a world in which nothing is? I'm going to have them read through the book of Mark. Hopefully, I'll be inspired as I put it together so that they, in turn, will be inspired...