Lent: A fast way to slow down

By Mia Pohlman

We live in a society of throwaway and convenience. We don't often think about how our actions affect others around the world, or how our actions affect the people of the future. We eat at fast food restaurants and throw away plastic forks after one use. We buy things to fill up our homes and closets that were, perhaps, made in factories in which people were treated unjustly and paid very little. We focus on ourselves and our own desires -- desires that are often created by the society in which we live and consume media in -- and do whatever it takes to satisfy the gnawing in us for more.

And then Lent happens. Lent. A pause. A breath. A renewal. An intentional trek into the desert with our Lord to practice awareness and discipline in trial. A time of saying "no" to ourselves so we have more time and room to say "yes" to God and God's people. A season in which we somehow ironically experience joy, life and freedom again.

I read a meditation about Lent the other day from "The Word Among Us." In it, it states, "Denying ourselves something simple like dessert can help us become less attached to our own comfort and pleasure. And that kind of detachment can open our eyes to the needs of other people. It can also bring us to the point where we can put aside our comfort for the sake of reaching out to our brothers and sisters in need."

The meditation advocates for fasting "from those things we think we have a right to," such as free time and having extra clothes. This call to hold everything with open hands and put the needs of others before ourselves through fasting, prayer and almsgiving is what Lent is all about.

Lent slows us down and is anything but convenient. In it, God calls us to fast from ourself and the things we choose for ourself. In this fast is a gift, a cultivation of an awareness of how our desires -- even for good things -- often control us. In it is the firsthand knowledge that, with Christ, they don't have to.

In Lent, God calls us to pray. As Jesus sought his Father in the desert, so do we. We can't experience the gift of fasting, without prayer -- prayer reminds us that God loves in us, with us, through us.

In Lent, God calls us to give ourself and our things away to others, to both people we do and don't know. This, I believe, is a fruit of fasting and prayer. Our fasting frees us from ourself, prayer steeps us in God and the way God views the world, and this moves us to want to show this love we receive in prayer to others. Fasting and prayer make us more generous because we realize through them our own humanity and, likewise, the humanity of those around us. We can, together, try to understand this shared condition we are all trying to figure out.

Let's use the remainder of Lent, no matter how we have or haven't used the first part, to continue to grow deeper in our God.