LENTEN THREESOME

                             LENTEN THREESOME

 Jesus summons us to follow him by imitating his bold example of praying and fasting in the desert for 40 days and nights and in giving himself to others to the last drop of his blood.
Just as the devil tempted Adam and Eve in the Garden and Jesus in the desert, so he seeks to tempt us to disorder our relationship with ourselves, others and God.
Fasting, almsgiving and prayer are the threesome antidotes. The more we fast and prioritize spiritual nourishment over material food, the less vulnerable we will be to being tempted by bread and earthly pleasures.
The more we sacrifice ourselves and our belongings for others’ good, the less prone we will be to giving in to the devil’s seductions to seek power or control over them.
In addition to being a great remedy against the seductions of the Evil One, these three traditional practices are also a great means to help us reorder our relationship to God, our neighbor and appetites.
First, prayer. If God is truly first in our lives, we will want to commit to making the loving dialogue with God our foremost priority.
Rather than squeezing him into our day when we have time, we resolve to center our whole lives on him. Some Lenten resolutions to do this would be to come to daily Mass, “stay awake” with him in Gethsemane through Eucharistic adoration or a daily Holy Hour, pray the Stations of the Cross on Fridays, or try to attend a Lenten mission or retreat.
Second, fasting. Many of us, though believers, live like materialists, laboring harder to stock our refrigerators than to nourish ourselves spiritually.
Fasting helps us to say No to the devil’s temptations to prioritize our stomachs over our souls. It allows us to subordinate our bodily desires and needs to those of the Spirit, to control our desires rather than let them control us. The fast I ordinarily recommend is threefold: to drink mainly water throughout Lent, give up condiments on food (salt, pepper, sugar, butter, ketchup, salad dressing), and forsake sweets and snacks between meals. That’s a type of fast that not only is healthy, but at the end of 40 days will fill you with the discipline that it takes to be a disciple!
Third, almsgiving. Our biggest spiritual cancer often flows from selfishness or egocentrism. That is why the Lord commands us to give alms; to look toward others’ needs, not just our own; to love others in deeds and not just wish them well;  and to take responsibility for others’ welfare, for as often as we fail to do something for them, we fail to care for Christ (Matthew 25:45).
How charitable should we be? We should try to give more than our surplus time or resources, but extend ourselves like the widow with her mite, something that will conform us to Christ’s standard of loving generosity. We should also be deliberate about our charity, not just engaging in “random acts of kindness,” but having a concerted game plan of self-sacrifice, just as Jesus had one toward us from before the world’s foundation.
Like sportspersons having seasonal training to get back to the basics after a monsoon off, so Lent is the time for Christians to get back to the building blocks of a life built on Christ.
Championships often depend on the work done to form the habits that lead to greatness. Catholics would similarly profit from using Lent to jump-start the plan to form the habits that lead to virtue and ultimately to the eternal “Hall of Fame.”