In the Catholic calendar, Ash Wednesday marks the beginning of Lent, forty days of penitence and self-sacrifice that come before Easter. The notion of self-punishment is one that many of us don’t relate to, but sacrifice is really a matter of giving up something smaller for the sake of something larger, as when you sacrifice some comfort by turning down your thermostat slightly in the interests of burning less fossil fuel.
What would you consider giving up, if only for 40 days, for the sake of a larger good?
I’d like to add that fasting has a great value in many traditions (hinduism, christianism, native american, new age, islam…) as a mean to achieve a better spiritual presence. A Pentecostal friend once told me: when you’re fasting, God sees you. Dispite I think God/ess/Universe always sees us, I think it’s a good way to point out how fasting, or other forms of sacrifice, can be very purifying, helping us being more present to the Divine or merely to ourselves.
Blessed Be.
Stefano