Is fasting an option for Christians, or is it an
obligation? Well, what did Our Blessed Lord say about the question of fasting? We read in Mark:
Now John's disciples and the Pharisees were
accustomed to fast. People came to Jesus with the objection, "Why do John's
disciples and those of the Pharisees fast while yours do not?" Jesus replied,
"How can the guests at a wedding fast as long as the groom is still among them?
So long as the groom stays with them, they cannot fast. The day will come,
however, when the groom will be taken away from them; on that day they will
fast" (Mk 2:18-20).
Notice Our Lord did not say that His disciples might
fast after He had gone; He said that they will fast.
In the gospel, at one point the apostles tried
to exorcize someone & were unsuccessful. They went to Jesus & asked why they
had failed. Jesus said that certain things were obtained only through
"prayer & fasting" (Lk. 9:25-29). Matthew writes of Jesus as fasting forty
days and forty nights (Mt. 4:2), and the Church leaders at Antioch fasted
and prayed before sending off Saul and Barnabas to preach the Word (Acts
13:3). And, Paul speaks of his frequent fasting in second Corinthians.
St. Thomas Aquinas wrote:
...fasting is useful as atoning for and
preventing sin, and as raising the mind to spiritual things; and everyone is
bound by the natural dictate of reason to practice fasting as far as it is
necessary for these purposes. (Summa Theologica, Pt 11-11, 147, 6.)
So, St. Thomas Aquinas believed that fasting is
required by our human nature. And according to Canon Law all Christians are
obliged to fast:
All members of the Christian faithful in their
own way are bound to do penance in virtue of divine law; in order that all
may be joined in a common observance of penance, penitential days are
prescribed in which the Christian faithful in a special way pray, exercise
works of piety and charity, and deny themselves by fulfilling their
responsibilities more faithfully and especially by observing fast and
abstinence according to the norm of the following canons. (Code of Canon LawCode of Canon
Law, 1983, Can. 1249.)
The subsequent Canons, 1250-1253, specify the
laws of fasting and abstinence (more on this below). We should note that Canon Law
prescribes fasting for all the Fridays of the year, not just during Lent:
Abstinence from eating meat or another food
according to the prescriptions of the conference of bishops is to be
observed on Fridays throughout the year unless they are solemnities...
(Canon 1251)
However, Canon Law also allows the bishops some
leeway:
It is for the conference of bishops to determine
more precisely the observance of fast and abstinence and to substitute in
whole or in part for fast and abstinence other forms of penance, especially
works of charity and exercises of piety. (Canon 1253)
And, in fact, the US conference of bishops did
just that in 1966:
Among the works of voluntary self-denial and
personal penance which we especially commend to our people for the future
observance of Friday, even though we hereby terminate the traditional law of
abstinence binding under pain of sin, as the sole prescribed means of
observing Friday, we give first place to abstinence from flesh meat. We do
so in the hope that the Catholic community will ordinarily continue to
abstain from meat by free choice as formerly we did in obedience to Church
law. (Pastoral Statement on Penance and Abstinence, 1966).
It seems that we priests could do a better job
of promulgating this statement of the bishops, since many Catholics assume
there is no longer any penance to be done on Fridays outside of Lent.
The Purpose of Fasting
Fasting, according to St. Thomas Aquinas, has
three purposes. The first is to control the disordered desires of the flesh,
not just the desire for food and drink but all the desires of the flesh,
including sexual desires. St. Jerome wrote, "Venus is cold when Ceres and
Bacchus are not there." In other words, lust is cooled by abstaining from
food and drink. The second reason for fasting is to enable the mind to more
freely contemplate the things of Heaven. If we are focused on food all the
time, it is hard to keep our attention on the spiritual life. By detaching
ourselves from the delights of food, we are able to attach ourselves to the
more subtle delights of the spiritual life.
The third reason for fasting is to do penance
for sin, whether one's own sins or the sins of the world. We should keep in
mind that the penance we receive in confession is not designed to totally
make up for our sins. In the 4th and 5th centuries they were, but many
people delayed confessing their more serious sins because the penances were
so difficult. Gradually the penances were reduced so as to get people to
come to confession. We should add our own additional penances if we want to
completely make up for our sins. And, how much better to make up for our
sins in this life than in Purgatory. St. Catherine of Genoa wrote, "He who
purifies himself from his faults in the present life satisfies with a penny
a debt of a thousand [silver pieces]..."
When Mary appeared in August, 1917 to the three
little seers at Fatima, she told them, "Pray, pray a great deal, and make
sacrifices for sinners. Many souls go to Hell because they have no one to
sacrifice and pray for them." In other words, our prayers and sacrifices can
actually bring people the grace to help them convert and be saved, when they
were heading for eternal ruin. The children were always on the lookout after
that to do penances (make sacrifices) to save souls from going to Hell.
St. Augustine summed up the value of fasting
well. He wrote that fasting cleanses the soul, raises the mind, subjects
one's flesh to the spirit, renders the heart contrite and humble, scatters
the clouds of concupiscence, quenches the fire of lust, and kindles the true
light of chastity.
Fasting Norms
The Church prescribes two days for fasting, Ash
Wednesday and Good Friday. On those days people over eighteen and under
fifty-nine are to eat only one full, meal. Two other meals may be eaten, but
taken together they must be equivalent to less than the one full meal. I had
a friend in the seminary who used to say on Ash Wednesday, "Well, I've eaten
breakfast and lunch. Now I'm going to have to eat a big dinner to equal
those two." Needless to say, this brought a big laugh. Obviously the one
full meal should be a normal sized meal.
What if you are sick on a fast day, and you need
to eat? Then you should eat. It is sometimes a virtue to break a man-made or
Church-made law. In that case, it would be imprudent to keep it. This
virtue, known as epikeia in Greek, epiky in English, does not apply to the
moral law. Epiky applies only to laws made by the Church or mankind, and
only if there is a good reason why the law itself does not apply.
In addition to the two fast days, the Church
prescribes Ash Wednesday and the Fridays of Lent as days of abstinence from
meat for those fourteen and older. Is that all the fasting we should do?
Probably not. The Church ordinarily prescribes only the bare minimum, the
lowest common denominator for universal practice.
Personal Fasting
It depends on the person, but most of us should
do other fasting as well. Some fast on bread and water on Fridays. If you
can do that, fine. But what if you feel sick when you do that, or you can
not do your work that day, or the next? Then don't do it. You might try a
boiled potato, or something else, or fast from television, radio or some
other thing you like.
Some of the children in our school give up
television for Lent. I know that's a big sacrifice for grade school
children. When I was in high school I gave up television for Lent. I
(foolishly) had been doing my homework while watching. That Spring my grades
shot up dramatically. When I got ordained a priest I resolved not to watch
television except on Sundays and feast days. That has been a great blessing!
St. José Maria Escrivá de Balaguer encouraged a
penance of eating less of what you like and more of what you don't like.
When I was in the seminary, from time to time they would have some very
large homemade chocolate chip cookies. They also had beets on occasion. Need
I tell you which I didn't eat and which I did for penance?
Another possible penance would be a "cold shower
sandwich." For this, when you shower you turn on the warm water and once
you're warmed up, you turn it back to cold for a minute or so. Then turn it
warm again. Or, if you want to be macho, just go for cold all the way!
Imagine the number of souls you could save with that one!
Some times just accepting or embracing a
hardship can be a real penance. Whether it's sickness or an injury or a
failure, or a job loss, we can turn it into a redemptive sacrifice by
praising God for it instead of cursing it. St. Francis de Sales got quite
sick once when he was scheduled give a Lenten retreat. He had to go to bed
and miss the retreat. He later wrote about this to St. Jane, "If God doesn't
want me to serve him by preaching but by being ill instead, all well and
good. His will be done!"
He quietly accepted many discomforts, including
extreme cold in winter and intense heat in summer. He preferred "passive"
mortifications, that is, penances he didn't choose, because as he put it,
"Where there is less of our own choice there is more of God." People would
often stop him as he was rushing off to an urgent task, and he would
patiently hear them out.
Incidentally, the Church used to prescribe the
fast we now have on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday, for all of lent,
excluding Sundays. This is no doubt the origin of the suspension of our
Lenten penances on the Sundays of Lent. That, and the fact that every Sunday
is a feast day, celebrating the resurrection of our Lord.
How do you know when your fasting is reasonable?
It should make you uncomfortable but should not interfere with carrying out
your duties. Incidentally, this very question as to how to be sure your
fasting is reasonable is precisely why the spiritual greats of the Church
have always recommended that you fast only under the direction of a
spiritual director.
Now, your fasting should not make others
uncomfortable. If someone invites you to dinner at their house on a Friday
when you've been fasting all day, do not just sit there with two pieces of
bread and some water at your place; eat a normal meal with everyone else.
Denial of The Will
Remember, fasting is the denial of the will, not
of the body. God said to St. Catherine of Siena in The Dialogue, "Whoever
wants for my sake to mortify his body with many penances and not his own
will does not please me much..."
Obedience can sometimes be a better penance than
fasting from food. Teresa of Ávila was tempted to disobey her spiritual
director and perform heroic acts of penance in imitation of a holy woman of
the town. The Lord spoke to her: "Do you look at the penance she does? I put
higher value on your obedience." So obeying our superiors, or keeping the
traffic laws or just fulfilling our duties in life could be a greater
penance than fasting.
And, of course, fasting or doing penance must
always be done with prudence. Fasting to the point of ruining your health is
not pleasing to God, as St. Bernard and St. John Vianney learned the hard
way.
Fasting is something every Christian should do
to control the desires of the flesh, to free the mind for the more subtle
joys of contemplating God, and to atone for sins. But fasting itself must
always be governed by reason.
* * *
Perhaps we don't hear much nowadays about
fasting and doing penance. But, in every age, including our own, the saints
all took on fasting and penances. If we want to be holy, we should do the
same.
Fr. T. G. Morrow is a priest of the Archdiocese
of Washington (DC). This article was taken, in part, from his book, Be Holy
(Servant Books, 2009). His work can be seen at
www.cfalive.org.
