Lent started this last Wednesday.
Lent is a solemn season where Catholics prepare for Easter by fasting, abstinence and more.
Basically, by behaving.
Adam Piggott has a good piece here about Lent this year for him. It’ll be just the same for me. Each lent I try giving up this or that, but usually fail. And that failure is usually started by someone saying that Sundays are when we get a break from our lenten promises.
I myself have a few demons to exorcise and this year I mean to exorcise them. They aren’t horrible, but they need to be gone. Giving up alcohol is one. That’ll be tough, since nearly every friday for lent I’ll be with a gathering of men in a kitchen cranking out dinners. And it’s a gathering of men with a few kegs at hand (that I happen to have a key for).
That said, the last parish I attented, the pastor had a different view. Sure, giving up this or that for lent was laudible but that’s sort of the letter of the law, not the spirit. You should use the time to take stock and make improvements (which often means giving stuff up).
With me, that’ll be knocking off that last 10 lbs to hit my goal weight, by diet, fasting, and back to the weights and bike. I took a pass in the cold, then I had a class that required me to be in front of a screen for eight solid hours.
Sure. That’s an excuse. But it’s the one I have.
I will say that at my age, it’s shocking how fast any gains one gets vanish.
I’ll be aping a lot of what Adam says he’ll be doing. Especially fasting. I’ve found it easier than it would seem.
In other words, doing lent proper for once.
Inspected By Pat 