Lent and Sacrifice

Have you ever stopped to think, “What a blessing to live in a country where abstention from meat for a day is a sacrifice rather than the norm!”

Here in the U.S., the modest Lenten requirements can feel painful to our bodies, conditioned as we are to instant gratification of every minor craving. Yet, I’ve traveled to parts of the world where a fish Friday would be considered a luxury rather than a sacrifice, because families are surviving on a diet of corn or cassava. The concept of an Ash Wednesday fast would be incomprehensible to many of the children at the overseas Catholic schools we support, where the free lunch we provide is virtually their sole source of nutrition. Our fasting is their plenty.

To say that starving children are used to having empty bellies doesn’t minimize the seriousness of hunger. On the other hand, one of the benefits of growing up with plenty is that it almost forces us to learn discipline, simply because if we don’t ever say no, we will eat ourselves to death. That’s why we turn away desserts, cut back on sodas, buy diet food and go jogging at sunrise.