The Fruits of True Fasting
Brethren, it is the first Friday of lent and Fridays of lent are days for fasting and denying ourselves not only meat but all things which stop us from coming closer to our God. Today's readings give us the way we should fast truly and what fruits should characterise our fasting. Most times we think denying ourselves food or anything pleasurable is what really fasting means but it is far more than this. Firstly fasting should be a spiritual exercise bringing us closer to God by leaving all the pleasures of the world and focusing on God alone. Secondly, true fasting leads us to charity. Some of us may fast but then keep the food or anything we have fasted from for another day. This is not what fasting entails; what we have fasted from should be collected and given out in the form of charity, for fasting should make us feel with those who do not have when we pass through the experience of self-denial. Through self denial, we should feel what those who don't have everyday feel, and then be moved to help them.
This is why St Augustine teaches: "All the endeavours for fasting are concerned not about the rejection of various foods as unclean, but about the subjugation of inordinate desire and the maintenance of neighbourly love. Charity especially is guarded - food is subservient to charity, speech to charity, customs to charity, and facial expressions to charity. Everything works together for charity alone." (excerpt from Letter 243, 11). On the same note, Basil the Great wrote: "Take heed that you do not make fasting to consist only in abstinence from meat. True fasting is to refrain from vice. Shred to pieces all your unjust contracts. Pardon your neighbours. Forgive them their trespasses." Our fasting must be accompanied with almsgiving and good works.
The prophet, in the first reading, gives us the conditions for fasting to be genuine and bear fruit, it must not be of our selfish desires, but of use and benefit to the other. Its fruits must be to clothe naked, to share your bread with the hungry, to shelter the homeless, setting the oppressed free, and with these and more works of charity, God will hear our prayers. Let us examine why, how and when we fast today, so that our fasting will bear fruits.
On a spiritual level, in today's gospel Jesus challenges the system of just fasting for the sake of fasting or because it is a law, by preaching fasting and freedom. Fasting should essentially be that which brings us closer to God, not because it is a law. Understanding fasting in Jesus' perspective helps our fasting to be fruitful. Fasting is the way of self denial and detachment from worldly pleasures, especially sin so that we come closer to God. Sometimes we experience the sense of loss of Christ in our lives, maybe because of our sinful nature, and fasting here will help us to free from those sins, come back to God and ask for forgiveness.
Reflect, today, upon the small sacrifices you are called to make this Lent—especially on Fridays in Lent. Make the choice to be sacrificial today and you will discover that it is the best way to enter into a deeper union with the Savior of the World. Let this fasting and self-denial sacrifice make you develop a deeper spirit of charity in you.
Let us Pray.
Lord Jesus, today you teach and show me the fruits which fasting must bear for it to be authentic. Help me in this lent to practice true fasting and make me come closer to you and my neighbours through charity. Amen
Be blessed.
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