Fast

Mark 2:18-22

          I am a big guy. I may carry it well, I may be 'big boned' as my mom would say, but I am a big guy. I like to eat. I appreciate fine food along with the company of good friends. It is no surprise then that when I went to the Dominican Republic on a mission trip I was overcome by the disparity in the cultures. I ate well in the DR and was with good friends, but on a much simpler scale. I began to really appreciate even more the life we have in these United States. I also appreciated the faith and love of the Dominican people even though their poverty is far below even our standards. When I returned home I was reeling with lessons and images, some of which I have yet to fully unpack.

          One of the things I was able to discern right off was the food issue because it plays such a central role in my life. Oddly enough I realized the value of fasting, that ancient tradition that this reading speaks of. Fasting has an ascetic value. While I often clutter my FaceBook page with litanies of what I have eaten, where and all the delicious details, I could use a respite from that lest it become too important in my life. Food of course is crucial to everyone's life but it seems I and many others have elevated to an art form, perhaps even to godlike status. This is perhaps one way fasting can play a key role.

         While we know that we all need food to survive, what do we need to merely survive? What is needed versus what is wanted or desired? Further, as we are all brothers and sisters, what can we do to show solidarity and compassion for those who are not blessed with the abundance we have here in the United States?  If you really want to think about it, fast for a day (in accordance with your medical condition and perhaps with supervision) and while fasting think about the plight of 90% of the planets' population. Fasting may clear your brain a bit. Why is it that we are such a small percentage of the planets population and yet consume so much? An embarrassing amount actually.

            As we approach the Lenten season, now might be a god time to research and think about fasting.  The expression that comes to mind is 'Live simply, so others may simply live'. 

Now John’s disciples and the Pharisees were fasting; and people^* came and said to him, ‘Why do John’s disciples and the disciples of the Pharisees fast, but your disciples do not fast?’ Jesus said to them, ‘The wedding-guests cannot fast while the bridegroom is with them, can they? As long as they have the bridegroom with them, they cannot fast. The days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast on that day.

‘No one sews a piece of unshrunk cloth on an old cloak; otherwise, the patch pulls away from it, the new from the old, and a worse tear is made. And no one puts new wine into old wineskins; otherwise, the wine will burst the skins, and the wine is lost, and so are the skins; but one puts new wine into fresh wineskins.’