March 3, 2024
Flannery O’Connor, the great American writer, and faithful Catholic from Georgia once wrote a friend about starting a new novel: “I have 50 or 60 pages written but I still expect to be a long time at it. It’s a theme that requires prayer and fasting to make it get anywhere. I manage to pray but I am a very sloppy faster.”
What a great line: “I am a sloppy faster.” I don’t know about you, but I often find the discipline of fasting during Lent a challenge. Abstaining from meat on Fridays is easy for most of us, especially here along the upper-Shore rivers and Bay where seafood abounds. But intentionally going without something we truly enjoy -- be it snacking between meals or using social media – can be a little more difficult. Yet, as we know, it can open up a holy space within our lives and hearts to make us more compassionate, patient, and Christ-like.
It’s also important to remember, too, that Lent isn’t just about our own individual spiritual journey; we spend this time together as a family of faith. Thus, our Lord will use the prayer and fasting efforts we offer to Him on behalf of others (or offer for some concern we may have) in order to allow His perfect will to find room in the life of the person or situation for whom we are, in fact, praying and fasting. Ultimately, the discipline becomes a gift for others.
Flannery O’Connor knew that her writing talent and efforts began and ended with the inspiration of God, and so she fasted and prayed in order that she would not block His will in any way, either for herself or others. May we strive to do the same in these next weeks of Lent, no matter how “sloppy” our fasting efforts may be.