Hi friends, Bargain Bin is coming a bit later today, so do not despair!
[I had to think of something to throw up here at 11am, so you’re just getting what happened to be on my mind before I ran out the door to do school dropoff. As the title suggests it is mildly though not preachily religious in nature; I don’t want anyone to feel bad, so please skip this if you want! Okay, ye have been warned.]
Ash Wednesday was earlier this week, marking the start of Lent. I wasn’t supposed to eat any meat but I ate chicken because I forgot what day it was. [“WTF, why didn’t Dan make me a sandwich with meat in it? Now I have to eat two chicken strips so I don’t faint!”] My older daughter asked me what I’m giving up this year, and I smoothly said “Nothing!” because lazy uh I just find it more spiritually nourishing to add things rather than take things away. And if something is not great anyway — like, say, exclaiming “it’s cold as BALLS out here!” when I troop out to the car with the kids — then I shouldn’t really give it up for some short period of time, I should probably give it up full stop. Or at least pretend that I’m going to, until the next time someone cuts me off or I stub my toe or break a glass or it’s really, really cold in the morning.
I was a serious and pious child who made it through seven (!) nigh-unbearable years of Catholic school, so I am really an old hand at thinking up challenging and sometimes strangely specific Lenten sacrifices. I used to give something up every single year, as not doing so was not really an option in my family. Even during periods when I’d essentially stopped going to church, I would usually pick something and make a half-assed attempt at observance — you can take the girl out of Mass, etc. And I’m not alone in this; I’ve run into so many people who give things up regardless of their level of interest/participation in organized religion. Here, for you to mock if you will, are all the past Lenten sacrifices I can recall with a reasonable degree of accuracy:
– Talking back to parents (classic kid Lenten sacrifice, encouraged by my catechism teacher as I had no siblings to avoid fighting with; this probably lasted three days at most)
– Saying “shut up” to people (shut up, this is much harder than it sounds for a 9-year-old)
– Complaining about feeding/walking the dog (let the record show that I wasn’t a monster but he really wasn’t my dog so much as my parents’ dog, and they used me as cheap labor)
– Candy (this was a dark, dark Lent, friends)
– Whoa, fine, just the chocolate candy then (…somehow worse?)
– Spending my allowance and saving it instead (was mostly saving to buy more candy, so ehhh)
– Television (this would be a disaster today and I would never ever consider it, but when I was 10 we only had four channels at home — because we didn’t have cable — so my great “sacrifice” mostly involved missing “Star Trek” and “The Golden Girls” and writing more Baby-Sitters Club fanfic in the evenings)
– Lying to kids at school in vain attempt to make self seem cool (they weren’t buying anyway)
– All the swear words (all the ones I regularly used in middle school, anyway — I was already censoring myself)
– Nicking my grandmother’s trashy novels, hiding them under my bed, then lying to her about where they’d gone (I’m sure she saw through me. Also, I would totally still do this if I lived at home)
– Meat on Fridays AND ALSO Wednesdays (why tho? I could not say)
– Alcohol (I “gave this up” one year in college before I was technically legally able to drink, it shouldn’t even count)
– Coffee (any potential spiritual gain completely undone by amount of complaining I did)
– Eating enough on Lenten Fridays (I had holier-than-me friends and thought I should fast more and I was just po-faced and hangry and insufferable)
– Fighting with spouse over the pointless and utter misery of grad school (this one lasted perhaps a fortnight)
– Snapping at kids (if they would just STOP)
– Ignoring kids in favor of internet (fine, do whatever you guys want, I guess)
– Buying ANY new clothes or shoes or Kindle books for myself (last year’s goal, largely financially motivated)
That’s all I can remember. If you are a current or recovering Person Who Observes Lent In Some Fashion, feel free to weigh my sacrifices in the balance and find them wanting. If you feel like it, tell us the weirdest/hardest/dumbest thing you ever tried to quit (for any reason, not necessarily religious) and we can revel in our successes and failures together.
I tried to quit bread AND KITINYOT for Passover. (Eventually to “only chametz”, then to “well, not on the first day” then “not from sundown to breakfast the next morning”, which I am still capable of doing.)
It was almost always chocolate for me. Which potentially made Valentine’s day kind of awful. Though one year I tried caffeine, and that lasted for all of a day and a half before I wound up crying into a cup of black tea with a horrible headache.
Actual conversation in my head :
“John, making super rich, elaborate vegetarian meals is kind of missing the point of giving up meat for Lent”
“Yes but following the letter and not the spirit is very much in the religious tradition.”
TSK TSK.
I have done the whole “oh it’s Friday in Lent, time for my FAVORITE SUSHI” thing too.
Seconded.
I vividly remember driving past a church advertising “St Al’s Friday Fish Fry!!!” somewhere in Philadelphia. Pretty sure anything so decadent and celebratory isn’t a Good Lenten Decision.
I really liked the Lenten soup suppers my childhood parish had. It was also not much of a sacrifice, because I love soup and I would eat three bowls and all the bread I wanted.
Soup and Bread suppers were the best, aside from how everybody showboated with their best soup recipes and “bread” was interpreted pretty decadently. I used to help with the set-up, and I think at some point the supper was concurrent with the Church’s Star Wars movie marathon?
I would join that church.
I live in Texas and the local Catholic church hosts fish taco dinners on Fridays in Lent. Also, the grocery store has special “meal deals” on fish taco stuff as well (tilapia, cabbage, etc). Lent is way more enjoyable here than in the cold Northeast of my youth, gotta admit.
When I joined the Catholic church one of the retirement-aged dudes who helped out with RCIA talked about how great Lent is because it means every week he can go to his favorite restaurant and buy a lobster dinner.
I was pretty righteous (as converts should be expected to be!) and I am STILL angry about this, 15 Lenten seasons later!
My office-mate & I used to get sushi for lunch on Fridays, back when I was still sorta Catholic.
I basically tried giving up some variation of “spinach and homework” from age 6-16. A few years down the road, I’m giving up listening to my own bullshit and also processed sugar.
Please post excerpts from your Baby-Sitters Club fanfic, thank you in advance.
This past year I fasted on Yom Kippur for the first time in a long while (I did drink water). I did like the idea of it as a kind of reminder to appreciate what I have most of the time (I get to DECIDE whether to eat or not) and a reminder to be generous with what I have, and also as practice in not being a ragebeast when I’m uncomfortable.
I don’t have any of my childhood stories anymore. But I DID THEIR DIFFERENT HANDWRITINGS AND EVERYTHING, like I was writing a Super Special. It was physically painful for me to write typos in the Claudia sections.
Past Lenten sacrifices:
1. internet. age 8. howwwwww.
2. chocolate
3. television
This year I’m giving up skipping meals, so no fasting for me. I’m slowing.
“internet. age 8.”
you guys are all so young
I should give up skipping meals. I’m horrible about breakfast and lunch.
Not all! I am old, old like the sighs of mountains.
One of the toughest Lents for me as a kid was giving up chocolate, BUT I was rewarded with a huge motherlode of it on Easter from my mom and tia, who had given up the same thing. The other toughest Lent was giving up soda. Uggggggh.
Soda!! I think I did that one year too and forgot til you mentioned it. It’s funny, it is so Frowned Upon now that my kids have had it maybe twice in their lives, but I drank a ton of it. My dad was a soda fiend and we always had it in the house.
Haha, yup, so did we. So much Coke!! The good thing (??) was that I was kind of over it by the time I left home, so I don’t drink that much soda anymore at all.
I gave up soda almost every year as a kid. I hardly ever drink it now, which is good except for the fact that I have to think of something new to give up.
I did the giving up soda several years in college. It was so hard!
A friend of mine several years ago gave up coffee for Lent. That was a terrible Lent for those around her, and I gave her a huge jug of iced coffee on Easter morning.
This Lent I am going to do my best not to have one of the hot lunch options at work, but to have stuff from the salad bar instead (and no pudding); they are always huge portions and frequently very fatty, and I probably should not be having roast potatoes every day (especially as I have a big meal with my partner in the evenings; cooking and eating together is not something I want to give up, and having two big meals is not great). As it is free, it is easy to think that I should take advantage of it, but I am trying to reframe it in my mind by getting excited about nice salad options. In previous years I have given up meat and chocolate.
It’s weird saying to people at work that it is for Lent when they comment on the salads, as I am very much an atheist. I find Lent a useful framework for making changes that I know I should be making anyway, but which I don’t have the willpower to do by myself; with the external framework, there’s a defined stopping point, and it’s not just me doing something off my own bat. (My very atheist parents, however, would not be that into the idea of me doing something “for Lent”, though, regardless of this reasoning.)
I was raised atheist and have used Lent a couple times as a way to challenge myself to do something I think I should do anyway. Only I usually start halfway through because I don’t hear about it until it’s already been going on for a while, and then I can’t decide when a good time to stop is, so I just sort of peter back into whatever I was originally doing some time when the weather starts getting warmer.
As an atheist parent I personally find the idea of giving anything up for Lent hilarious, and perfectly understandable. It is a handy shorthand for “this is a trial run and potentially not permanent”.
My mum tends to get grumpy about the fact that Christianity’s pervasiveness in our culture means that even if you are an atheist you cannot fail to notice/have an opinion on notable Christian things; she does not see why it is a thing she should be expected to know about. For that reason, Lenten sacrifices are not really her thing, and I think she disapproves a bit that they are mine.
I just impulsively gave up alcohol for Lent this year as an excuse to get out of going to a wine club (as opposed to just being like, “sorry I don’t wanna”). I might actually try to stick with it, because I could use a drying out anyway.
I gave up alcohol last year (age 30). It was hard, especially since I was being such a stickler about it that people kept asking if I was pregnant! However, with a history of alcoholism on both sides of my family, I find it valuable to be able to prove to myself that I can go a while without drinking. This year I’m doing dry February, because my wedding and honeymoon are during Lent.
(TW for food issues) Lent was not a big thing in my Methodist family, but I lived in a very Catholic town, so what we were giving up was a source of discussion around the lunch table in middle school. Unfortunately, the popular thing to do was to treat it as a period of crash-dieting– no desserts, no junk food, no soda, etc. which are not in and of themselves bad things to try to cut down on, but it ended up being an excuse for 40 days of semi-disordered eating for a lot of us. Successful or no, it was just another reason to hate food/our bodies, but this time with added spiritual weight on top of regular societal pressures.
I’m no longer religious, but I think what you say about adding spiritually nourishing things to your life rather than practicing self-deprivation, especially of physically nourishing things, is really wise.
I usually avoid food-based Lenten practices for exactly this reason. The mindset is soooo iffy and easy to miss the point that way.
(Plus the fact that the 40 days generally falls right before things like spring break always made me <_< when not-even-Catholic acquaintances were suddenly giving up candy and French fries “for Lent.”)
I feel the same about New Year’s food-related resolutions, but this is probably because I have the willpower of a five-year-old in a candy store.
I will not deny that this may also have something to do with it. 😉
My priest had a cute sermon illustration Wednesday where he had kids circle him waving candy bars, while talking about how white-knuckling through Lent avoiding sweets was missing out on a chance to actually grow and blah blah blah. Then he asked the mom if it was okay for the kids to keep the candy, and she goes “we gave up chocolate for Lent. O_O” It was peak awkward.
I talked below about giving up various foods for Lent, and yeah, I’ve recognized that there’s definitely a tie-in there to some disordered eating problems I’ve had.
Same. I also went to a non-denominational church for a while when I was younger which had a weird preoccupation with fasting, and I can’t tell you how much it messed me up.
I’ve seen several lovingly-described “Lenten fasts” that were clearly clean-eating-orthorexia diet plans wrapped in purple vestments.
A beloved friend of mine who is a pastor does not fast. Or do any food-based lenten things, because of her past with eating disorders. I get that some people find fasting/cutting out meat/other foods as rewarding. But there’s always some seriously icky body image things.
Also, the point of Lent isn’t some sort or 40 day self-help thing. It’s not (exactly) make you a better person; it’s to suffer in a small way so that you might consider the suffering of Jesus. Arrghhhh #petpeeve
Oohh that makes a lot more sense (gets annoyed that religious primary school pushed the self-help thing rather than say they wanted small children to suffer)
Yes to this! I grew up Catholic — did any other ex- or current Catholics do the “30 Hour Famine”? Here’s how it works: A bunch of high school kids (mostly girls) lock themselves in a church and eat nothing for 30 hours to raise money for famine-stricken countries. It was just sitting around for 30 hours, not eating and talking about how you weren’t eating. And people started adding more and more time onto it voluntarily — 40 hours, 50 hours. And then there’s a giant feast at the end.
Ick. And I’m sorry that happened. It is wrong on many levels.
Yeah, I get that fasting is spiritually important to some people, not to mention biblical, so I’m happy for them if they can do it in a (psychologically) healthy and meaningful way. But personally I’ve never understood it for disordered-eating-reasons, and it has, in the past, been unhelpful in the extreme to listen to the super-holies talk about how spiritual they were because of their hunger.
Personally I have given up ice cream for Lent. All I can think about now is ice cream. I have said before that if I were a Shakespearean tragic hero(ine), ice cream would be my Fatal Flaw.
In 5th grade, I gave up cookies and then the girl scout cookies arrived. That was the year we discovered Thin Mints and Peanut Butter patties taste even better if frozen. Of course the now yummier frozen cookies were only supposed to be eaten on Sundays, because it’s technically not lent. That was a really hard year with many falls off the wagon.
I didn’t even HEAR of this Lenten Sunday-exception thing until COLLEGE and I felt so cheated out of SO MANY YEARS OF NOT TAKING ADVANTAGE.
Girl Scout cookies arriving when they do (we just got our order last night!) is the main reason I’ll never again consider giving up sweets for Lent.
Two years ago I gave up sweets and made a specific exception clause before Lent started for Girl Scout cookies and hamantaschen.
I never heard about it, either, until my Episcopalian friend told me in high school! My smug self totally viewed it as cheating and was secretly like I’m better at Lent than youuuu
Totally legit, Sundays are always feasts — but indulging for one day and then trying to climb back on the wagon can be tough, too.
Ah, but fasting on the Feast of the Resurrection (which every Sunday is) suggests that you’re not willing to cast off your sackcloth and ashes even for the remembrance of our Lord’s joyous return.
The only prank I’ve ever played on someone was during college when one of my roommates gave up chocolate for lent. Her mother sent her several boxes of thin mints and she stashed them in the freezer, scrawling her name and “DO NOT TOUCH” on every box. Our other roommate and I carefully cut open the boxes, hid the cookies in another inconspicuous box in the freezer (we did not eat them; this was just a gentle prank and we were not monsters), and glued the original boxes back up. She was SO MAD when she thought someone ate her cookies and did not see the humor in it even after we gave her back the cookies. That was the end of my pranking career.
ETA: Looking back, I am not proud of this prank and now would never think of depriving someone of their thin mints, even for a second.
I gave up my salvation one year, I think Lent has since ended, well, that one I mean, but it’s worked out so well that I kept that habit in my life. #notblessed
My grandfather always used to say he was giving up religion for Lent, a saying which my mom has since adopted. This particular apple did not fall far from the tree.
My uncle’s husband, who grew up in a very Catholic family, likes to say he gave up Catholicism for Lent. It’s a good theme for Lent jokes.
Gave up meat for lent some 12 years ago and somehow I’m still doing it, even though I haven’t been to a non-Christmas Mass in a good 7 years.
Oh right, it’s Lent says the lapsed Catholic, thinking happily about the chicken tikka masala she’s going to eat in a second and feel totally joyful about, because protein is a gift and I can’t believe I got through that many long Friday sports practices in grade school on a slice of cheese pizza alone.
I also became a vegetarian during Lent! Well, it was an excuse so that I could stop eating meat, otherwise my parents wouldn’t have gone for that “hippie vegetarian crap”, and then I just quietly never started eating meat again.
I never thought to do it that way! I just through a giant fit every time they tried to make me eat meat until they finally gave in. My mom would have totally gone for the lent thing…
I don’t give things up for Lent (but I didn’t grow up in a church that was real big on Lent anyway), but for the last ten years (now starting my eleventh), I’ve celebrated Lent by watching forty movies I’ve never seen.
That is so cool and I’m probably going to steal it.
You are welcome to it.
A couple years ago, I finally pulled all my Lent-related posts from LiveJournal (ten years ago was a very different time) and put up a WordPress blog which I rarely post to outside of Lent. http://maccrocodile.com/
I’ve been using MacCrocodile as a screen name since the end of the first year I did Lent; my 39th movie was The 39 Steps, and several commenters here (and only here, you guys should be proud), have recognized the reference.
I was phenomenally bad at Lent growing up while my brother was annoyingly good at it. I have very vivid memories of him sitting piously at the kitchen table while I ate ice cream like a heathen. I think I usually said that I was making an effort to pray daily/say the Rosary more, but I’m gonna go out on a limb and assume I didn’t actually do it.
I was a weasley nonbeliever (with a brother who is currently a seminarian), and the specific things I remember giving up are watermelon (not in season, not something I like anyway), homework (no), and religion (my mother did not think that was funny). He always gave up things like lying, video games and his allowance–gave it to charity instead. I’d call him a jerk except he’s really, really not.
I gave up shopping for lent one year. Discover called me to make sure I was okay.
That’s great customer service! I hope they would call me and say, “Whew! Glad you’re alive, since you stopped buying 90s murder mysteries and snacks.” 🙂 🙂 🙂
Oh, I used to be almost obsessive about giving up something for Lent. It was always food. Chocolate was a common one, and then chocolate and meat. Once I gave up bread, which was terrible and also difficult to decipher, because I couldn’t tell how far “bread” went (can I eat this muffin? I don’t know!!).
A few years ago I tried to give up all sweets, and I was so miserable that my husband came home one day with four pieces of cake and pleaded with me to eat some. I did. I don’t give things up for Lent anymore.
A colleague and I gave up swearing together a couple of years ago! We had a swear jar as well so every time we violated our self imposed rule we paid £1. After Lent, we went out for a nice lunch with the money.
Where the problem lay was explaining to other people that the money was not going to charity. Unkind points were made along the lines that:
1) we were giving up something we didn’t think we should be doing anyway
2) we weren’t doing anything nice for anyone else in doing so
3) we were going to actively enjoy the results of not having given up something we shouldn’t have been doing.
I did swear way less though, and I liked that.
I think I’m giving up caffeine for Lent this year. I haven’t had any caffeine (or alcohol) since Lent started, but that’s mostly because I had a terrible panic attack Tuesday night out of nowhere and I figured cutting back on caffeine couldn’t hurt. Except it does hurt because I have a withdrawal headache, but I’ve quit caffeine enough times that I know it’ll be okay soon.
The most success I’ve had with Lent was giving up meat, which maybe I did three times in college and grad school.
In high school, I remember giving up chocolate successfully one year, but just eating a lot of Reese’s Pieces from the vending machine instead.
One year I joked that I was giving up making out… this was a during a period where I wasn’t making out with anyone anyway, so that was easy! And it made me laugh.
I think I gave up soda once, when I was 7 or 8. Then I realized my parents weren’t Catholic and/or participating in Lent, and I was like, why am I doing this to myself? And that was it. My first and last headlining Lent tour.
I am also a lapsed Catholic who still gives something up every year! This year, as I mentioned in the link roundup yesterday, it’s Facebook on my phone and at work, which is itself part of my ongoing goal of removing some of the sources of anxiety in my life. So far so good. My most successful was two years ago, when I gave up the snooze button; least successful was I think four years ago, when one of my BFFs and I tried to give up bitching about some of the other people we were at that time forced to spend lots of time with. Lofty and noble, and we totally failed.
Oh man. That’s hardcore. If I gave up the snooze button cold turkey I’d just be late every single day.
Instead of giving something up for Lent my mom would always instead make a resolution type thing like “do one nice thing for a stranger every day.” I always liked that a lot more than attempting to give up cookies or tv or whatever. That being said, I had a horrible nail biting habit as a kid, so I gave biting my nails every year for several years in a row. Eventually it stuck when I was like 11 or 12, so I can’t say nothing good has ever come from the practice for me.
Now I’m very disconnected from religion and I didn’t even realize Lent was starting this year until I got into a very confusing conversation with a British friend on twitter about pancake day. I still don’t really fully understand the point of that, nor do I think they qualify as real pancakes.
In theory, Shrove Tuesday (pancake day) is the day where you 1) eat all of the food you’re going to give up for Lent, which has now come to mean pancakes and bacon, and 2) attend Confession and be absolved (shriven) of your sins, so you could start Lent off clean, so to speak.
ok thank you, that makes so much more sense. I kept asking why pancakes and everyone was just like “oh it’s just what you do!”
I think the tradition became pancakes because they’re full of sugar, eggs and butter/oil, and are easier to make quickly than any other kind of “cake”
On Halloween, the bus driver, who’s a recent immigrant from Hong Kong, had spent the day asking people why Halloween was a thing, and nobody could tell him until he asked me. I felt so useful!
Yeah, it’s pancakes because you’re using up all of your eggs and milk and butter and stuff, in preparation for the Lenten fast. (Our pancakes are real pancakes, US-style pancakes are bizarre.)
Even though I’m a Methodist I’ve always enjoyed Lent as a time of reflection and prayer and all that good stuff. One year I gave up processed sugar and I was HARDCORE about it–even ketchup was off limits. I thought it would be easy because I’m not a sweet-food person, but that was the year I learned sugar is added to everything. It was painful, but I really did feel healthier by the end.
The most thoughtful Lenten sacrifice, though, was the year I decided that unless it was necessary to to celebrate with friends (which was fairly rare), I would not go out to eat. This was when my husband was in grad school and I was working like crazy and we’d go out probably 2-3 times a week. So instead we’d create thoughtful and realistic menus each week and tried new recipes and spent more time together in the kitchen cooking.
This year I’m giving up meat twice a week (Mondays and Fridays) although I’m just biding my time until I forget and accidentally make a turkey sandwich for lunch on Monday.
Not religious, but one year I gave up alcohol for Lent. (I was of legal drinking age and a frequent and enthusiastic imbiber.) The thing is, if you’re not going to church on Easter Sunday, there’s nothing to stop you from drinking at 10am, turns out. Also, after 40 days, you lose a LOT of your tolerance for alcohol. Lesson learned!
It was an interesting and instructive experience while I was doing it, despite its less than graceful conclusion.
My spotted Lent history:
— Soda for years was my go to sacrifice because I LOVE soda and it is bad for you. I would give it up and then by the time Lent rolled around next year I would have become re-addicted (Monkeybutter, super impressed you broke the habit).
— In high school one year, I not only gave up soda but I also decided that for Lent, if I swore that day, I wasn’t allowed to read fanfiction as penance that day. Keep in mind that during 10th grade I was spending 2 to 3 hours a day reading Lord of the Rings and Batman fanfiction so this was a real sacrifice for me. (Ask me about my favorite LOTR fanfic writers! :))
— I was raised Catholic and still consider myself Catholic (just non observant and argumentative and one with complete disdain for my local diocese that may be unfair). BUT! I work for a Jewish organization. My first year I gave up sweets not realizing that hey, Purim falls during Lent usually. So no hamantaschen that year! WOE IS ME! The next year I gave up sweets but carefully included an exception clause for both girl scout cookies and hamantaschen which are seasonal.
— Last year I didn’t give anything up for Lent and did not observe meatless Fridays because I find the way Lent is practiced with fasting really dubious. It’s supposed to be a time of reconnecting with God and instead it becomes about giving something up which for me leads me to obsess over the thing I’ve given up and not actually grow in my faith at all or focus on the important things in Christianity (ie loving God by loving your neighbor). It felt hollow. I gave nothing up for Lent and carefully hid this from my devout parents in Texas because that would have been a THING. It was a quiet, secret “fuck this shit” rebellion.
— This year I’m not giving something up but instead trying to pray every day and read the bible daily as well as passages from St. Thomas Aquinas (I have an app! It’s great!). I’m back to not eating meat on Fridays. I really want to use Lent this year to reconnect spiritually to my faith.
–Relatedly to me but not about me, one of my favorite Lenten practices is something my dad does where he tries to remember to say a prayer for people who annoy him in traffic rather than swearing at them. I have never been able to do this.
Several years ago, a divinity-student friend of mine told me about an article he’d just read about a priest (?) who ate a chocolate-covered strawberry every day during Lent, to remember the glorious bounty of God’s creation. She made herself eat it very slowly and mindfully, though, with lots of time to reflect on God’s nourishing and sustaining love.
What app do you use? I am interested in an app for daily Bible readings, but there are so many that the choice frightens me! And I’m a little afraid to ask for recommendations from people in my (Catholic) church, in case it becomes too intense. But the Toast seems to be a great place to ask for such a recommendation!
I can’t believe no one has asked you about your favorite LotR fanfic writers yet. Tell me them!
Didn’t grow up religious, but I became a vegetarian for like a week in high school, out of a vague feeling that it would make me seem cool. But then my mom took us to Back Yard Burgers and I was like, oh, fuck it.
I could happily go weeks without meat but then Lent rolls around and I have to go one day and I basically bitch about cheeseburgers to whoever happens to be around.
This post reminded me that for Lent I was going to give up checking the internet at work. Whoops.
Nikki, only 7 years of Catholic school? Pssh, I did the whole 13!
My most memorable sacrifices:
— Age 6, giving up swear words.
— Age 10, giving up television with commercials. PBS and Disney did not count.
— All through junior high and high school: giving up meat. This was mostly because my mom wanted to and she cooked all of my meals…
I wanted to give something up this year, and I asked my live-in gentleman to consider doing something with me. He was not enthusiastic, but I did end up somehow getting his slug butt to say that he would start jogging with me in the spring. That is good enough for me!!*
*Because of this thread, I asked him if he would give up meat with me. Let’s see how this goes.
I mean, thank God it WAS only 7 years. My neighborhood public school wasn’t terrific, and my parents thought I’d do better at the local Catholic school across town. It was perhaps better academically, but in other respects not so much. I switched to public school for middle and high school and it was so much better.
I might start running again, but I can’t pretend it’s for Lent reasons, or that I haven’t been telling myself to do so for a couple of years now.
I wish I had only gone for 7!
I am not even close to Catholic, but I used to do Lent sometimes as a way of reminding myself that there are things that I like, but that I’m okay not having. Except I always did this in theory, rather than in practice, since I could never remember when Lent started or when it finished.
I also like to periodically abstain from something for no reason, just as a personal challenge and to retain perspective. It’s not tied to Lent or anything, it’s just something I do from time to time.
Good thing about the fact that UK culture is permeated with Christianity to a weirdly heavy degree, despite the fact that not many people are that religious: you cannot miss Lent, because Shrove Tuesday is extremely prominent (adverts everywhere reminding people to buy stuff to make pancakes with for Pancake Day) and we get a four-day weekend for Easter.
Ah, yes, the long Easter weekend. Nobody let me in on that the Easter I was in Belfast and so by Easter Monday I was starting to pace up and down the street in hopes that one shop, somewhere, would open.
I still missed Lent though.
I can’t remember much about what I’d give up because it never lasted long. HOWEVER, one year in college I gave up making out with strangers for Lent and it was a legit hardship. I think that’s the last thing I ever gave up for Lent.
I’m trying to give up my snooze button for Lent.
It is difficult. I do not like it.
THIS SOUNDS BAD
IT IS THE APPROXIMATE WORST MY BED IS SO WARM
*mumbles incoherently about suffering in remembrance of Christ’s suffering or some shit*
This is a really good commitment. I kinda want to do this, because I’ve never heard of anything that rivals the suffering of Christ so closely. Like, meat, soda, chocolate? meh. Actually getting out of my bed before 7? WHAT FRESH HELL IS THIS?
I was trying to figure out something to give up for Lent, and decided to start drinking Diet Coke again (which I had successfully given up a few years before) so that I could abstain over Lent. Now over a decade later, i am fully re-addicted to Diet Coke, which is my reward for being such an idiot. And I am giving it up this year for Lent.
My mom’s family is Quite Catholic (or at least was raised that way, she’s a veteran of 13 years of Catholic school) and I was A Little Catholic (CCD classes in 2nd-6th grade) and I had no idea that people giving up things for Lent was even A Thing until well into elementary school. I have never done it and I don’t think I ever will.
I gave up soda a few years ago, broke the habit entirely, then fell back into it this summer. Back to square one. I have done the entirely vegan for Lent thing before, but probably not going to this year. My tea needs milk and you can pry it from my cold dead hands. Might cut out meat entirely again (since I haven’t any since my Incredibly Fat Tuesday so why stop now?) even if it does alarm my poor mother. I think she’s just jealous I’m out-Catholicing her. Religion isn’t a competition, but I’m winning.
Some brands of soymilk are tasty in tea. But I didn’t start drinking (soy)milky tea until after I stopped consuming dairy, so I have no basis for comparison.
This year I’m giving up podcasts and the use of headphones. I think of it as a way to incorporate greater mindfulness into activities that I usually do only with the aid of entertainment bribes: dishes, commuting, exercising, etc.
This week there was TREMENDOUS drama among my fellow church coffee hour hosts. Should we only serve pretzels during Lent, as has (apparently) been done in the past? Should we do something a little less minimal, but maybe cut out the sweets since people give them up? Or do we recognize that Sundays are feast days, not fast days, and just do a normal coffee hour? Would “a nod to Valentine’s Day” be appropriate? OPINIONS!
I have mostly boring Lenten sacrifices (meat, chocolate, sweets, social media), but how about stories involving enjoying the best pork chops I have ever eaten only to realize just after having consumed them that it was, in fact, the first Friday of Lent? Because I have…more than one of those.
I definitely had brunch one Friday in Lent in Boston with some Catholic friends and we ate an entire plate of bacon before someone said, “wait, isn’t it…Friday?” and then we all felt semi-horrified except for one out-of-town girl who was all, “oh I knew it was Friday, but I thought maybe there was some kind of exception here in New England that I didn’t know about!” like, it’s true that bishops have a lot of authority within their dioceses, but there is no Boston Lenten Bacon Clause.
Haha, wouldn’t that be amazing though? (brb moving to Boston) My personal favorite regional exception is that alligator counts as a “non-meat” along with fish in Louisiana.
Amphibians, reptiles, and fish actually count as non-meat everywhere! The weird Louisiana exception I like is nutria, which got snuck in cause a bishop who’d never seen one was like “lives in water? Sounds good – eat away!”
Really? Huh, I didn’t know that. Not much in the way of alligator here in Northern California, though! And I had to look up nutria…it looks like something in the beaver family! I always thought the distinction was ‘cold-blooded’ rather than ‘lives in water’, myself…
That would make much more sense, yes! I think there was some intentional subterfudge involved tbh.
My college dining hall ONLY served bacon on Fridays, so Lent was torture while I had a meal plan. To make matters worse, sometimes they would crumble up the leftovers and hide them in whatever creamy soup was for lunch that day. I was fooled by bacon-y clam chowder more than once.
I’m Christian, but a Jewish friend invited me to Yom Kippur services because I was interested in the worship. We went to dinner beforehand, and I ordered pork chops. They were very good. Didn’t even think about how inappropriate that might have seemed until much later. I would not make a very good Jew.
ahaha, my favourite version of this is having had an epic Fat/Pancake Tuesday with all our friends, I wasn’t thinking the next morning and scarfed about four leftover brownies for breakfast on Ash Wednesday (I should probably add that I was still a practicing, Mass-going Catholic at this point. Oops.)
I was always simultaneously feeling guilty for not giving up ENOUGH STUFF for Lent but also way too lazy/self-indulgent to actually give up something like chocolate, or biscuits.
Last year’s brilliant idea was interrupting people. My friend who I told still brings it up sometimes to laugh about it. Going to try again this year because sometimes I am a stubborn bastard. Have already broken resolution several times in the past three days.
i gave up being Catholic. It lasted Lent and then an additional 15+ years. I still mumble something to my grandparents about giving up sodas when they ask, though. Catholic guilt is strong.
These are all very, very fun to read. The first year I was old enough to know that Lent was a thing (eight, I think) I kind of gave up sweets. But I gave myself a giant loophole, like I was allowed to have dessert after dinner. That was the year I cheated the most. No self-control at all.
Other memorable sacrifices:
1. Chocolate (multiple years)
2. Soda and tea
3. Livejournal and Myspace
4. Complaining about my coworkers to other coworkers (this was more of a “thing that needs to be stopped all together” and it kind of worked)
Usually this time of year I make an effort to start going to Mass again if I haven’t been lately. It is partly spiritual and partly because I really like all the Lent church music.
mmmm yes I’m also giving up Livejournal for Lent, not because my last entry was about four years ago
It was a great personal struggle in 2005. I had to go to fanfiction.net a lot that Lent
One year, I realized that L&O: SVU was actually hurting my soul (I was unemployed and watching several hours of it a day; don’t do this, kids). So I gave up Law & Order for Lent as a springboard to giving it up forever. However, since Sundays don’t count, I binged on the Criminal Intent marathon on Sunday evenings, which overdosed me enough that I found it very easy never to watch a L&O other than Classic Flavor ever again. And I’ve been almost entirely clean for several years now.
This year, I’m giving up fanfic, because I’ve been spending horrifying amounts of time on it lately (“I must read everything on this pairing, so I will start with page one on AO3 and work backwards through the archive in a methodical way”), and neglecting my actual life and responsibilities (and seriously cutting into my Netflix/book time).
I’ve become addicted to Miss Fisher fanfic…? I don’t know. I only read a bit before bed or over lunch, but I’m MAD that I don’t have time to read more.
My shameful secret is movie-based Thilbo fanfic. I’m not entirely sure how it happened, but it needs to stop. And it’s actually difficult not to go to AO3 and search for it right now, so I’m pretty sure this is a good thing for me to be giving up.
Most years I fail in my Lenten practices, to the point where last year I didn’t bother doing anything because the church whose ordination I am seeking was already putting so much on me in the form of required schooling. The one time I DID succeed in my practice, I broke my soda habit. So that’s cool.
This year, I am doing a 40-day journal and reflection thingy on the writings of Howard Thurman. It’s required for class, but I don’t mind too much because I really like Howard Thurman.
This is GREAT! I’m very interested in what your reading list is.
The book that we’re following is called 40-Day Journey with Howard Thurman, which pulls from a selection of his writings. However, if you’re looking to just read his works without a structure like that, you can’t go wrong with Jesus and the Disinherited. Supposedly MLK Jr always carried a copy with him.
I’m doing a 40 Day reflection journal thing too, mine is Kathleen Norris
I’ve read her Acedia and Me. My friend swears by The Cloister Walk, but I haven’t read that one yet.
I gave up potato chips once and discovered I was good at giving things up. I’m an all or nothing kind of person.
I gave up swearing when my daughter was a toddler because my husband said he was afraid she’d think her name was C– Damnit! (She doesn’t think that’s her name, but I still occasionally swear. Obviously potato chips are easier to give up than bad language)
I see your Damnit! and raise you the time my potty-training toddler yelled FUCK in the middle of a change. I AM THE WORST, ETC. ETC.
My first grader was busted a couple of months ago for writing a list of curse words while on the bus. There is a 100% chance she learned them from me. Or maybe my mom. Or my grandparents. You are not alone. (My husband was disappointed that ‘fawk’ was spelled wrong…)
I once restricted myself from visiting my six favorite websites (which at the time were all trashy celebrity gossip sites) for Lent. I wasn’t even religious – I just knew I had an Internet Problem. And I made the amateur mistake of mentioning that I was doing this on Facebook. A few hours later a girl I sort of knew in college (now a comedy writer, super cool chick) posted something to the extent of: “I always lose respect for people when I find out they are giving up something for Lent.” And then a piece of me died forever.
That girl was awful and mean.
There were a couple of years where I gave up reading fiction for Lent. It was terrible.
And I became quite a rules-lawyer– does it count if it’s a religiously-themed story? Does it count if it’s Sunday– Sundays outrank Lent, right, even in Lent? Does it count if it’s just a comfort-reread of a favorite chapter after a hard day, it’s not like I’m reading anything new… it was terrible.
I could never, ever do that. That is so much harder than sweets!
I remember giving up chocolate as a young teen. I’m not sure why – I don’t remember my Episcopal church making a big deal out of it, but it appealed to me.
For the past several years I’ve added one thing and given up one thing. This year, like last year, I’m adding 20 minutes of daily meditation (6 days a week) and I’m giving up buying ebooks – because I own so many unread ebooks and its both budgetary and a way of (theoretically) appreciating what I already have.
My meditation practice is going well. Not buying an ebook is SO Hard so far – although I’m being pretty gentle with myself about it. It’s kind of fascinating to notice how often I think that I deserve to buy a new book as a treat or as an escape.
I also used to steal my mom’s (not gma’s) trashy romances and hide them in the bed crack and plead ignorance of their whereabouts and thought I was deliciously sneaky and I…was not.
Same here! I feel like I’m part of a special club now.
(Dang, but those books were educational. That’s where I learned cunnilingus was a thing, and that’s when I knew I was going to like being a sexually active adult.)
I finally broke my OhNoTheyDidn’t addiction in college (so, like, 8+ years ago) by giving it up for lent one year.
– Soda
– Chocolate
– Soda AND Chocolate
– Television
I was a stubborn completer of all tasks, and pretty self-motivated, so that I can say with every degree of certainty that I full subscribed to these promises. I did not subscribe to subsequent promises in later years involving things like “beer” and “smoking” and “the other kind of smoking.” I have never attempted, nor will I ever attempt to give up curse words.
I’m a sporadic Lent observer (my branch of Protestantism doesn’t really do it, so I’ve been on my own the few times I’ve given it a try). In second year university, I gave up non-homework-related Internet, with the exception of email, Youtube (but only if I watched movies or tv shows, because then it was like TV? I am a pro at rationalizing) and MSN Messenger on Sundays (because I had just started to get to know my [now] husband and he was away in Ottawa for four months and I didn’t want to lose all opportunity to talk to him).
I still haven’t quite figured out how to word what I’m trying to do this year. I’ve been meditating a lot on Isaiah 58, which ties fasting to the undoing of oppression, as opposed to self-denial for self-denial’s sake, so I want to do something more outward-focused. I think I want my Lenten practice to be really intentional about doing everything I can to make my church a safer space for LGBTQ people (calling out homophobic language and attitudes, providing resources to people who need them, etc.) It’s not super quantifiable, though, so I’m not sure how Lent-y it is.
Does anyone know where the “choose one thing to give up” thing came from? My understanding (raised Protestant, now Judaism-adjacent atheist slash occasional Unitarian, so pretty minimal understanding of Lent) is that historically it was a fast, and everyone gave up the same long list of bodily pleasures (animal products, sugar, alcohol, sex(??), etc.). This is definitely what it’s like in Eastern Orthodoxy; in Russia at this time of year you can get Lenten meals at many restaurants.
That’s a really interesting question and I’m kind of embarrassed I’d never even thought of it before.
My high school boyfriend gave up *my boobs* for Lent one year. It was very, very embarrassing.
I have never *personally* observed Lent, but I did have a mad wild crush on a boy in high school who did, and I recall that (THIS IS TRUE) his sophomore/my freshman year he gave up masturbation for Lent (!) I remember his friend group, to which I did not quite belong but on the periphery of which I desperately lurked, musing whether it would count if his girlfriend gave him a handie.
I went to an all-girls Catholic high school, but spent a lot of time with kids from the all-guys school. Giving up masturbation was something that many of them did and they all talked about it!!
I went to Catholic schools for 5th grade up to 12th, and I was Very Very bad at being able to pack lunches, and my parents didn’t have significantly better executive functioning on it than I did, so mostly I just bought lunch. (that is the short version of that story, tbh)
They did not serve meat on Fridays during Lent. But they didn’t add new options. They usually offered cheese pizza and peperoni pizza. So, on Fridays, they just offered Cheese. (Not, like, Cheese and veggie). It did not go very well for me, since over time i was more and more lactose intolerant, so by senior year, i would eat fries for lunch on Fridays during Lent, nothing else. It was Not Great.
I have given up meat completely a few times, but in the last few years, including this one, I’ve done no meat just on Fridays. Past observances have included praying the rosary every day, reading the Bible every day, saying grace before dinner every night (growing up, we only said grace at parties and other festive occasions) (daily grace has become a full-time habit now, so that worked out!).
One year I gave up avoiding a particularly boring girl in my residence, who was in the habit of cornering me and being boring for what seemed like forever, until I would openly yawn and look at the clock, hoping for escape. But I did not run into her all that Lent, despite really not having been avoiding her!
This year, in at attempt to become a more effective parent, I tried to give up giving time-outs to my three year old. But yesterday he kicked me in the shin, and right off that wagon. I will still try for the rest of Lent though.
OMG at the photo from “Sister Act 2: Back in the Habit”
I even played its hip hoppy version of “Joyful Joyful” recently, followed by my friends’ WTF reactions. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OaEH1e_DLm0
It’s “O Happy Day” that REALLY GETS ME. And, I’m sorry, the “Hail, Holy Queen” from the first one.
I’ve done wishy-washy things for Lent like, “I will eat lentils every day” when I already eat lentils several times a week as is. (Seriously, Big Lentil, please hire me for PR, I am down)
Hard Lents have been: dairy & cheese. Easier ones were fast food and chocolate.
One year in junior high our parents had us give up television one night per week. The night of abstinence rotated each week. This was pre-Internet days so there were no Smartphone or computer-based work-arounds and boy, those were some grim, dark nights in our household. I remember sitting in our living room listening to the clock tick and wondering what kind of madcap shenanigans I was missing on that night’s MASH episode.
Now I’ve mastered the potato chip/soda/chocolate routine so I think it’s time to find something to do instead of something to not do.
Meatless Fridays are also no sweat so maybe I should switch to Gluten-Free Fridays? Vegan Fridays? No caffeine Fridays?
I once gave up the guy I was dating.
That one wasn’t too much of a sacrifice, tbh. And it turned out to be unsurprisingly permanent.
(I’m not Catholic.)
I gave up alcohol the year of college when all of my friends wanted to go to frat parties. I dded and sat through the parties sober. It was a dark time.
A couple years ago, I gave up the whole internet, which was the worst idea EVA. I was in school, so I was allowed to use email and jstor and such, but only wikipedia for strictly research purposes. It was very complex. At one point, I got into an involved argument about How Ignorant Pre-Renaissance Europe Really Was About Greek (sure, only 4 monks read it, but when your entire literate population is 8 monks, that’s not too bad, right? I was wrong) and my best friend had to cut and paste long excerpts of the relevant Wiki-ing into an involved email precis. It was a high-point of both friendship and extreme nerdery.
I posted in a reply above about having given up alcohol for Lent last year. This year I’m getting married in the first week of March, but I’m not drinking at all in February, so I’m just going to say I’m giving up alcohol for the first half of Lent and living in sin for the second half 😉
One year, I think I was 22 or 23, I gave up alcohol. The very next day, I was out to dinner with friends and the one sitting next to me ordered a Woodford Reserve bourbon, neat. Those of you who are not familiar with Woodford should know that it has the best aroma, like angels and ice cream if ice cream had a smell. I almost cried.
Another year I gave up “anything that tasted sweet,” which for some odd reason meant giving up COLD Diet Coke (nevermind that it definitely has a sweeter taste at room temp, but is still more delicious when icy cold). By the time Holy Week rolled around, I had developed the interesting side effect of an extremely sensitive sense of smell. Then I devoured the world’s most massive Easter basket on Sunday.
I have also given up swearing… when I was in high school… at an evangelical/charismatic school, where swearing would earn you demerits. Obviously I had still developed a sailor’s mouth despite that fact. This year I’m giving up weed. I intend to be very annoyed with this in a couple weeks.
In sixth grade I tried giving up starch for Passover even though my family did not practice any religion, because the girl I had a crush on was Jewish and observant and I wanted to be like her. (I know it’s not all starch, but I didn’t have access to matzoh anyway, and also I was not totally clear on the details since I wasn’t raised Jewish.) But then I got up and had cereal as usual.
We are hardcore Catholics on my mother’s side, and Lent is our Super Bowl of Self-Sacrifice. Things I have given up:
1) Chocolate, various years
2) Tastykakes, specifically, in solidarity with my mother, various years
3) Dessert
4) Soda (and it stuck)
In grad school, I started doing a full fast (just water) for Ash Wednesday and Good Friday, which I’ve been pretty consistent about. I think being raised in a very traditional household, there is something about the experience of self-denial that defines Lent to me. The first Gospel on Sunday is always the Temptation of Christ in the desert, and I always think of that first enticement, “Turn this stone into bread.” I always equate physical hunger with the spiritual.
When adding a practice of spiritual nourishment became en vogue, we started attending weekly Rosaries, daily Masses (also something that has stuck for me, schedule permitting), and eucharistic adoration, and praying while exercising (a suggestion from one of my aunts). The one thing I have never been able to deny myself after giving up soda is caffeine as a whole, specifically tea. Last year, this same aunt decided she was giving up coffee, or the life’s blood of every physician. I only saw her on a few occasions, because I live several states away, but I heard all the details from my mother. An essential part of the Super Bowl of Self-Denial is discussing you devotions/abstinence of choice in a play-by-play fashion with one another through your medium of choice (phone, text, Facebook, in person, etc). And as is customary for the first Friday of Lent, I woke up this morning and reflected, “I want bacon wrapped in bacon.” Never mind that I can have that any other day of the week (except Wednesday this week), I still only wanted today. I want it now.
And I want to add that as much as I’m being glib about the Super Bowl analogy, the season of Lent becomes a way to build connections within families and faith communities, because it’s a shared experience for those of us who choose to practice. There are abiding, familiar rhythms, and I still really value them. Also, when I gave up dessert last year, my mother bought me Easter candy (as she has my whole life), but didn’t give it to me until I came home for the summer in July, because she had hidden it and forgotten about it. It was especially lovely because I had said at the time, “I really am a grown up. I just bought my own candy in the Monday sales.” This may seem silly to anyone else, but it was a small and beautiful reminder that I was loved, and I think that is, for me, anyway, the entire point of Easter.
I am just here to admire and share in your Lenten refection. “I want bacon wrapped in bacon”. Mmm…bacon.
The mist transformative thing I’ve given up for Lent was clicking on links I knew would just annoy me.
Transformative because it was a relief, buy also because it caused reflection on the differences between hard/truth revealing reads and unimportant irritations.
Changed my clicking and reading habits permanently
I gave up Twinkies one Lent when I was around 10 or 11. So… I apparently ate Twinkies regularly enough back then for it to be a real sacrifice.
I always used to give up whipped cream when I was little, as it was my favorite food. I didn’t really have it often enough to warrant giving it up though (such a lazy/cheating lent sacrifice, haha), so whenever my aunt saw me during Lent she’d make whipped cream and eat in front of me. Thanks, Auntie, for keeping me grounded 🙂
A recovering Catholic here. 50 odd years ago, in seminary, gave up hot water. Mmm, Sunday showers.
Fighting with my brother, which let’s be real, I was always unable to keep.
Coke
Chips when I was 28, this one was the woooooorst
Candy was brutal, yeah. I had some Nerds at a friend’s house in the last couple weeks, and still remember the extreme, EXTREME guilt.
Best Lent ever, I gave up swearing and about three weeks in threw down a “FUCK THIS” and gave up entirely.
I gave up LiveJournal once (2004, I’m pretty sure) and people reallllly noticed. Because I was head-and-shoulders the most prolific LJer most of my flist knew.
My church is studying the Pope’s encyclical this year and encouraging environmentally-focussed Lenten vows, so I’m avoiding disposable plastics (and paying a ‘sin tax’ on plastics I do throw away anyway).
So far I am four dollars in debt to plastic, because I JUST HAD TO buy all those slushies at the game over the weekend. So my weirdly-specific tax system is turning out to be a worthwhile safeguard :p
My church is studying the Pope's encyclical this year and encouraging environmentally-focussed Lenten vows, so I'm avoiding disposable plastics (and paying a 'sin tax' on plastics I do throw away anyway).
So far I am four dollars in debt to plastic, because I JUST HAD TO buy all those slushies at the game over the weekend. So my weirdly-specific tax system is turning out to be a worthwhile safeguard :p
Ye Americans with your freedom of religion have no idea. Lent in Ireland is a big fucking deal, except that it’s not. I don’t think any adults actually take it seriously anymore, but the primary schools bang on about it constantly, even the supposedly ‘non-denominational’ ones.
By the time you’re about 7, lent has gone from a thing that you do to be good, to a subject of highly sarcastic remarks (for 7 year olds.); generally the question of ‘What are you giving up for lent?’ is met with various:
‘School’
‘Homework’
‘I’m giving up giving up things’
And then we discovered the whole ‘you don’t have to give up things, you can take something on instead.’, that was a fun year where we all pledged to eat more chocolate and watch more TV. (Children are amazing at figuring out loopholes in even the most strict religions.)
Ye Americans with your freedom of religion have no idea. Lent in Ireland is a big fucking deal, except that it's not. I don't think any adults actually take it seriously anymore, but the primary schools bang on about it constantly, even the supposedly 'non-denominational' ones.
By the time you're about 7, lent has gone from a thing that you do to be good, to a subject of highly sarcastic remarks (for 7 year olds.); generally the question of 'What are you giving up for lent?' is met with various:
'School'
'Homework'
'I'm giving up giving up things'
And then we discovered the whole 'you don't have to give up things, you can take something on instead.', that was a fun year where we all pledged to eat more chocolate and watch more TV. (Children are amazing at figuring out loopholes in even the most strict religions.)
I live in Texas and the local Catholic church hosts fish taco dinners on Fridays in Lent. Also, the grocery store has special "meal deals" on fish taco stuff as well (tilapia, cabbage, etc). Lent is way more enjoyable here than in the cold Northeast of my youth, gotta admit.
I just read this whole thread because I love the toast and miss going to church and actively practicing my religion and loved to hear others talk about it like it’s a normal thing to do (it wasn’t where I grew up, though I attended church with my mom as a kid). I fell out of the habit of going to church when my first son was about 9 months old, because I had to go alone with the baby (husband is non-religious) and around then it became an hour’s wrestling match with a stroppy, squirmy proto toddler. I had another kid exactly 2 years after the first and the logistics got worse, especially because I don’t _expect_ them to be quiet in church, but I _want_ them to be quiet in church, and the noisier they would get, the crankier I would become (which, when you’re a 3 year old little boy who feels ignored, is hilarious!).
For lent I have done the usual chocolate, candy in general, soda, and one year all sweets. I always found those to be sort of anti climactic, because I would psych myself up for the week leading up to the fast like, “yeah, I’m having an ice cream now, but _next week_ it’ll have to be herbal tea…” and then even if I was consumed by DESIRE for the soda or whatever for the first 10 days or so, eventually I did lose my taste for it, and would sometimes find myself slightly grossed out by my Easter basket and the candy would last for weeks. The memorable year was the year I was feuding with this other girl among my extended friend group, we’d been despising/ignoring each other for like a year, and around that time of year I realized that I was messing myself up over it, so I gave up “hating her” for lent. I mentioned this for some reason in the car with my ex-Catholic dad and he was like, “so, on Easter morning, are you going to cheerfully resume your hatred in a joyous celebration of the resurrection of our Savior?” I was a bit baffled, because I’d never thought about the point of _ending_ the lenten fast, to me the fast was always the end in itself, like a marathon or something, and assumed that watching the spaces between sugar cravings lengthen over time was kind of the point. I don’t know where I got this idea, because obviously that’s not what it would be like to hang out in the desert with no food. I think somehow I’ve always linked lent with processing grief for some reason?
On a side note, I read a couple of these comments to my husband while I was reading them and my 5 year old (the same little boy who got me _out_ of the habit of attending church in the first place) overheard and asked us what an atheist was. We told him it was someone who was really very sure there was no god, and left it at that. He thought about that and then announced that he was “One THOUSAND PERCENT sure that there _was_ a God,” and I can’t describe the relief and pride that flooded me, unexpectedly (he takes after his father a lot, who has always seemed to me to be kind of constitutionally just without any spiritual feeling or need, and who is a really excellent person anyway). I thought that it would be okay with me if my boys took after their unspiritual uncurious non religious Papa, but I guess it matters after all.
We just moved house and are closer to the neighborhood Catholic Church now, and I’d be more excited to check the new church out except for its “I regret my abortion” billboard that, while small, seems to scream at the sidewalk from the church yard. I hope that despite this unpromising bit of landscaping, I will be able to find a few feminist kindred spirits. Fingers crossed or whatever.
I gave up Full House one year as a kid. It was PAINFUL and about halfway through I decided I could watch reruns every day just not new eps.
Gave up pop once and didn’t drink it for three years or so, same with booze. Wish I could give up pop forever.
Two years ago I gave up soda and it was HARD. Almost every year I try to give up candy/sweets/icecream to some degree but end up caving by the second week. Most of the time, I add something to do, like eat more vegetables or be patient with my sisters even though I’m climbing my Homework Mountain and they’re not helping. It’s a little like a New Year’s Resolution for Lent.
Two years ago I gave up soda and it was HARD. Almost every year I try to give up candy/sweets/icecream to some degree but end up caving by the second week. Most of the time, I add something to do, like eat more vegetables or be patient with my sisters even though I'm climbing my Homework Mountain and they're not helping. It's a little like a New Year's Resolution for Lent.