Lent starts somewhere around 14 minutes from now. I have had friends that give things up for lent every year. Some that have given up chocolate or alcohol. Others have given up sex (they weren't married), the internet, or television. However, the practice of giving up some kind of vice for lent has never appealed to me.
I simply can't understand how someone would define something in their own lives as a vice and deem it worthwhile to only give it up for 40 days. If it is enough of a vice to give up for 40 days, shouldn't it be given up all together?
Randomly enough, those who use those more contemporary vices (tradition and history was mainly dietary things given up) never seem to stick with tradition and allow themselves those things on the Sundays before Easter as the 40 days excludes the Sundays.
While I love the tradition of a period of time leading up to the celebration of Easter, and even admire many traditions and their practice of different lent season activities, the contemporary model people practice of picking a "vice" and giving it up just doesn't appeal to me.
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
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2 comments:
Interesting. Lent sacrifices have never been represented by any of my friends as "vices". My understanding is that what is given up should be something of enjoyment or value in one's life - thereby representing a true sacrifice versus a behavior that needs correcting. I guess I've never been told it needs to represent a vice or something negative.
Tradition was one of sacrifice, originally dietary sacrifice at that. By no means does everyone who gives up something for lent pick a "vice" but many who choose to and also come from a church tradition or denomination that doesn't observe lent closely seem to choose something this way. I highly respect and admire those which choose based on sacrifice and am confused by those who pick "vices" instead.
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