Editorial (01/31/08)
Suggestions for Lent
Q: I would like to ask your advice about something. Do you have any suggestions about what I should do for Lent? I would greatly appreciate any advice you could give me. Thanks.
N., in Christ,
The Church recommends three penances, and it is from the Church where we should learn to pray and what God's mind is regarding how to do penances. So what does the Church teach us?
Three words: Prayer, fasting and almsgiving.
Each of these can have countless different applications. Those who give up sweets during Lent apply the principle of fasting. Those who do more volunteer time offer a sort of almsgiving. Those who attend daily Mass through Lent apply that of prayer. And so on.
The Pope repeats the importance of exactly these three forms of penance in his Message for Lent, 2008. This year he offers us an important reflection upon almsgiving, as an important way for overcoming the love of money, what St. Paul accuses of being the "root of evils," and as important way for growing in forgetfulness of self and love of neighbor, which are essential aspects of the spiritual life.
A wise thing to do is to examine yourself during Lent, and see where there might be some form of disordered self love. The names of the capital sins can be of help in discerning this: pride, anger, sloth, envy, greed, lust and gluttony. And the more spiritual sins are usually more critical to address than the bodily ones. Then discern which of these defects affects you such as to, more than the others, weaken or wound your friendship with God by sin. You can call that your "dominant defect."
Once you have isolated your dominant defect, or you think you came pretty close (don't spend all Lent thinking about it and then not getting anything done), make a promise to do one concrete thing, either prayer, fasting or almsgiving, to crucify that dominant defect. Then you'll have the perfect Lenten penance.
Let me offer an example. Let's say Beth is lazy. She has examined herself, and sees that she sleeps in, postpones her homework, never cleans her room, wastes time, etc. So for Lent, she decides to get up 15 min. early (crucifying her laziness) and praying the rosary (doing the penitential work of prayer).
Or again, Suzanne is proud. She has examined herself, and she sees that she's vain or even immodest in her dress, she thinks she's better than everyone else, gets into continual arguments with parents and teachers, and so on. So for Lent, she decides to "fast" as regards her speech: silence.
This means that when corrected by adults she will respond with a (sincere) smile and a thank you, and if harassed by other school-kids she simply won't respond to them and go on her way. Or again, maybe she will attend to her dress; or again, make it a point to speak well of others, crucifying her vanity, fasting from speech about herself, and always put others higher than herself.
This is the way to work. Remember that even though prayer is mentioned as a penitential work, prayer is much more than that, and is an essential key to making progress in the spiritual life.
Any form of penance which is "strange" is out of bounds, like, "I'll dress in garbage bags every day so that others can laugh at me and I'll grown in humility." No, that's not the right way. Also out of bounds are penances which affect your health adversely, like the one who wanted to fast three times a week. That's too much.
For corporal penances, it is wise to keep your confessor frequently abreast of what it is your doing. That will give the Church the chance to make sure you don't overdue it, and it will give the penitent the exercise in humility to submit herself to the judgment of a priest in these matters.
Corporal penances, especially fasting from food, are an important part of the spiritual life, but if done imprudently, they can expose one to pointless weakness and, worst of all, pride.
Love God above all things, and your neighbor as yourself.
[Note: As the correspondent is a young lady in high school, it is for this reason only that the examples all refer to both young women and teen life.]