Lent

Although I am not Catholic, I have been observing more about the Catholic faith from Keegan's family and by doing a little bit of extra reading just to familiarize myself with the customs of the church. I've always heard people discuss what they're "giving up" for Lent and never really known what that means or which religious groups actually do that as part of their celebration leading to Easter.

"There are traditionally forty days in Lent which are marked by fasting, both from foods and festivities, and by other acts of penance. The three traditional practices to be taken up with renewed vigor during Lent are prayer, (justice towards God), fasting (justice towards self), and almsgiving (justice towards neighbor). Today, some people give up a vice, add something that will bring them closer to God, and often give the time or money spent doing that to charitable purposes or organizations."

I've been thinking a bit about what it is that would be my vice, something that would be hard for me to give up and would actually cause me to pause and think a minute whenever I actively chose not to use that particular vice. My major vices are Diet Coke, sweet treats, and television, and of those three I think it would be most beneficial for me to give up the sweet treats. I don't always have much time to watch tv, so that wouldn't necessarily be causing me any added inconveniences by eliminating it for the next 40 days. Plus Keegan will be home and watching television too, and in a small-ish townhouse, I think it would be difficult for one of us to give it up without imposing on the other. Also, I know I would not stick to that through Lent, seeing as how March Madness will be entirely encompassed by that time period. As far as Diet Coke goes, I've already began limiting myself to one per day and I would literally not function if I stopped drinking it entirely. Caffiene is not something you can give up cold turkey, like smoking, so it would be unwise to select something like that to give up for Lent, at least in my case. Plus, I would be so irritable that I might annoy people to the point of driving away the new friends I've made here at Duke.

But with sweet treats, I mainly use them to reward myself for hard work, or when I'm feeling blue. I don't really eat that much ridiculous stuff, but cookies, sweet cereals (mmm, Cinammon Toast Crunch, mmm), mints, and the occasional milkshake from Cook Out (we're talking once every 5 weeks though on that one) generally work their ways into my diet. I could also include general junk foods, like french fries and other fried food, in that category too. I think if I really want to become more active in my faith, I should start turning to prayer instead of to my box of Capn Crunch for pick-me-ups, and hopefully that's what giving up sweet things will help me do.

So I guess I have until Wednesday to finish the bag of mints I have at home :-P