Lent: Fasting and Abstaining Overview 

The two are similar but distinct.     

When fasting, a person is permitted to eat one full meal, as well as one or two smaller meals that together are not equal to a full meal.  Liquids may be taken at any time.  

Abstinence means refraining from eating meat as an act of penance (or choose to abstain from other food if you don’t eat meat).  

Beyond food… 

Making the sacrifice to ‘give up’ something is an act of self-discipline.  And the more we can discipline ourselves, it gives us freedom to make better choices about what we truly need versus what we ‘want’ in the moment. 

Fasting is a spiritual exercise, and as such is primarily an action of the inner life, drawing us nearer to God.  It also helps us be more aware of those in our world who have so little. 

Plan your Lent well by thinking and praying about things from which you want to fast.  Besides food, consider fasting from talking… and listening more; fast from your phone or device every evening or a whole day; fast from the television, screen scrolling, or video games.  Think about what consumes your time away from prayer or spiritual reading… and fast from it for specific periods of time in your week. 

Authentic Christian fasting helps to release us from our attachments to the things of this world.  

Holy Spirit, help us. 

With you in prayer, 

Fr. Jim Deiters