Post by Admin on Sept 17, 2014 11:14:26 GMT -7
about fasting:
The subject came up in an email and the Christian season of lent began this past Wednesday so I thought I’d share a few thoughts with you.
Fasting (eating less than normal) and perhaps less so abstinence (generally defined as abstaining from meat) are common practices in several religions. The purposes are varied and often overlapping: memorialization of an event (Jesus in the desert for 40 days); purification in preparation of a special holy day or holy season; mortification of some sort associated both with penance (that’s the purification part) and the practice of will to strengthen oneself against temptation to ‘sin’; and focus on spiritual matters.
This last one is often overlooked as we seek to follow the rules and forget the reasons. It also reflects itself in both sides of the “doing something more” coin. Eating less takes conscious effort and it hurts. What happens when those hunger pains present themselves? Does one think about how hungry he/she is and leave it at that …struggling of course against opening that bag of potato chips. Hopefully not because that is the moment to focus if only for a few seconds on whatever supreme energy that is the focus of one’s cosmology. For Christians, Jews and Muslims it will be God. For polytheists it will be Gods and Goddesses or ones ancestors. For Buddhists it may be the Supreme Void to be reached at the end of many lives. One need not dwell on these thoughts nor analyze them. This is not a moment for meditation but rather a moment of presence and recognition of the All That Is and how it is present in our lives and we in its consciousness; however we define that.
The other side of the fasting period is not so much what one will give up but what will one do with what is given up. One might save time by preparing and eating simpler meals. Money might be saved by buying less and simpler food or not eating out as much. What might one do with that time and/or money? Even if this amounts to a few cans and packages of foods placed in the food donation box at the office it is transmuting the fasting which is not really negative but by definition is giving something up, to giving something over. It is potentially making a difference in two lives; ours and the one that benefits from that which is given.
At TNS we encourage people to be creative with their spirituality while not always feeling that they have to re-invent the wheel. There’s not much to re-invent about fasting though there are many different approaches and nuances (you should see the fasting rules for the Antiochian Orthodox Christian Archdiocese of North America). If you do wish to practice some type of fasting, whether for lent or some other occasion I encourage you to see it in positive terms and to use it as a means to enlarge your own sense of the presence of the All.
Peace and blessings,
Rev. John
The subject came up in an email and the Christian season of lent began this past Wednesday so I thought I’d share a few thoughts with you.
Fasting (eating less than normal) and perhaps less so abstinence (generally defined as abstaining from meat) are common practices in several religions. The purposes are varied and often overlapping: memorialization of an event (Jesus in the desert for 40 days); purification in preparation of a special holy day or holy season; mortification of some sort associated both with penance (that’s the purification part) and the practice of will to strengthen oneself against temptation to ‘sin’; and focus on spiritual matters.
This last one is often overlooked as we seek to follow the rules and forget the reasons. It also reflects itself in both sides of the “doing something more” coin. Eating less takes conscious effort and it hurts. What happens when those hunger pains present themselves? Does one think about how hungry he/she is and leave it at that …struggling of course against opening that bag of potato chips. Hopefully not because that is the moment to focus if only for a few seconds on whatever supreme energy that is the focus of one’s cosmology. For Christians, Jews and Muslims it will be God. For polytheists it will be Gods and Goddesses or ones ancestors. For Buddhists it may be the Supreme Void to be reached at the end of many lives. One need not dwell on these thoughts nor analyze them. This is not a moment for meditation but rather a moment of presence and recognition of the All That Is and how it is present in our lives and we in its consciousness; however we define that.
The other side of the fasting period is not so much what one will give up but what will one do with what is given up. One might save time by preparing and eating simpler meals. Money might be saved by buying less and simpler food or not eating out as much. What might one do with that time and/or money? Even if this amounts to a few cans and packages of foods placed in the food donation box at the office it is transmuting the fasting which is not really negative but by definition is giving something up, to giving something over. It is potentially making a difference in two lives; ours and the one that benefits from that which is given.
At TNS we encourage people to be creative with their spirituality while not always feeling that they have to re-invent the wheel. There’s not much to re-invent about fasting though there are many different approaches and nuances (you should see the fasting rules for the Antiochian Orthodox Christian Archdiocese of North America). If you do wish to practice some type of fasting, whether for lent or some other occasion I encourage you to see it in positive terms and to use it as a means to enlarge your own sense of the presence of the All.
Peace and blessings,
Rev. John