Prayer and Fasting

Ash Wednesday Year B
Homily by Deacon Joe Stackhouse
February 22, 2012

On Ash Wednesday, it seems appropriate to talk about two traditional themes of Lent. One is prayer and the other is fasting. When it comes to prayer, Jesus is our model. We read in Scripture that Jesus often went out alone to a secluded place and prayed. We can only imagine what the content of his prayer was, but we can be sure that he spoke openly and honestly with his heavenly Father. We can also be sure that, since he came to do the Father’s will, he spent time in prayer discerning what that will might be. If Jesus found it necessary and beneficial to pray to the heavenly father, surely we can do no better. The Lord’s Prayer offers a loving and beautiful way to spend time talking with our heavenly Father, for the words that Jesus gave us contain all that we need to know about how to pray.

When it comes to fasting, we usually think of this in terms of giving up food. Kids are especially fond of this method. My grandson told me that he was going to give up chocolate and diet soda for Lent. He changed his mind about the diet soda, however. The idea of fasting by giving up food is certainly appropriate for adults as well, but there are other ways of fasting. We can give up our critical remarks about others. We can give up our rejection of others. We can give up those ambitions that we know are not in keeping with the Father’s will. There are many other ways of fasting that one can think of with some reflection.

If we apply these two themes to our daily lives during this season of Lent, I suspect that we will be better off at the end of Lent than when we began. Happy Lent.