Is Lent Just About Giving Something Up?

The good old Lenten season has finally arrived! Which means it’s time for Catholics to buckle down. This is pretty crazy to say, but I consider this my first REAL Lent. Before my reversion, the only thing Lent meant for me was giving something up. And although I was sacrificing something, I didn’t fully understand why. It just seemed like a fun challenge to do at the time. I can see how a big portion of the Catholic society relates to this. Unfortunately, it’s a common thing. I was inspired to write a blog on this topic because I wanted to go a little bit more in depth as to what Catholics are encouraged to do for the Lenten season and why.

First, let’s talk about what Lent actually is at its core. Lent is a time of preparation for the passion of Jesus Christ. This includes his suffering, life, death, and resurrection. This is a crucial period in time because it is what our faith stands on. We are called to take a part now to imitate Christ in different ways in our lives. Fun Lenten Fact: Lent consists of 40 days. These 40 days do NOT include any Sundays following up to Easter Sunday. Sunday’s are a day of observation so that’s why they are not considered a part of Lent.  

Have you ever wanted a new beginning? Did you ever make resolutions on New Year’s Eve, your birthday, or the new school year? Did you ever just want to start over and become new? Well, that’s why Lent exists. It is there to challenge us to grow in holiness and become the people we were created to be.

So, I’m not knocking the concept of giving something up for Lent. I think it is crucial to do so for the season. But I don’t think giving up chocolate, TV, or music is necessarily going to make me a new person once the season is over. I will probably go back to those things afterwards as if they never left my life. Have you ever heard of the three pillars of Lent? If not, no worries. I didn’t know about them for a big portion of my life. I went to Catholic school and church every Sunday for 18 years, yet never heard of this concept. Hard to believe, right? So if you’ve always known of them, you’re way ahead of me.

The three pillars include fasting, prayer, and almsgiving. Fasting is the most commonly known one. When we fast, we are supposed to choose something in our lives that we get pleasure out of. This can be candy, a certain kind of food, listening to the radio, watching movies, cursing, etc. Fasting from this one things gives us self-control and discipline in one area of our lives. It teaches us how to die to our own desires. It allows us to focus more on God and what he has to offer us, rather than focusing on what they world can give to us. It can get really difficult because of course it is a sacrifice. But we are imitating Jesus’ sacrifice for us on the cross. Fun Lenten Fact: Abstaining from meat on Friday’s in Lent(plus Ash Wednesday) is a form of fasting, but it does not count for what you are giving up for Lent. Sorry to break the news, but you can’t kill two birds with one stone for this one.

Prayer sounds pretty self-exclamatory. You may think, “Well I already pray to God every day so I can skip this one.” Prayer in this sense is referring to any FORM of prayer that isn’t already in your daily schedule. This can mean praying the rosary every day. It can mean picking up a new spiritual book and committing to read a chapter every day. It can mean actually picking up the bible and reading scripture every day and then meditating on what you’ve learned. Prayer can come in all sorts of shapes and sizes. But the point of this is to go out of your comfort zone and do something new with your prayer life. This will allow us to grow closer to Christ while preparing for his passion. I personally believe prayer is the secret weapon for bringing peace into my life. But sometimes we get too comfortable with the type of prayer that is most convenient for us, and we don’t want to take that step to do a little more.

Almsgiving is probably the least known pillar of Lent. For the last two pillars, the focus is solely based on you and your relationship with God. But this one involves you, God, and the rest of His people. God doesn’t want us to become too self-centered. So almsgiving is a form of giving back to the world. A common practice of almsgiving would be to commit to doing 3 acts of kindness per day. Another one might be randomly calling a friend or family member every day just to ask how they’re doing. These acts of giving of ourselves help us to focus less on our worries and problems. A wise man once said, “The best way to get yourself out of hell is to get someone else out of it.” Loving radically is what we Catholics should be focusing on with each and every encounter of the day.

Once you choose something for all three of these pillars, and pray about it, you are ready for Lent! If you are a little late, that’s okay! We still have a ton of time left before the Resurrection of Jesus. Better late than never. You got this. Take advantage of this Lent and make yourself anew. You know you want to change, so here’s your chance.