Humbly submit your will to God (Thy Will be done) and consecrate yourself to the Sacred Heart of Jesus through Mary and Joseph.
The disciples of John approached Jesus and said,
“Why do we and the Pharisees fast much,
but your disciples do not fast?”
Jesus answered them, “Can the wedding guests mourn
as long as the bridegroom is with them?
The days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them,
and then they will fast.” No one patches an old cloak with a piece of unshrunken cloth, for its fullness pulls away from the cloak and the tear gets worse. People do not put new wine into old wineskins. Otherwise the skins burst, the wine spills out, and the skins are ruined. Rather, they pour new wine into fresh wineskins, and both are preserved.” MT 9:14-17
Why fast? As I continued to ask others how they discern what to do for Lent, I continued to search for the purpose of Lent. The Catholic Church requires (not optional) for us to fast. Why during Lent? It is to prepare ourselves, looking at the crucified Jesus, for His Passion, Death, and Resurrection. The best answer I can come up with is quite simply because Jesus asks us to. Why? According to Fr. Schmitz, it is because being obedient to Jesus is pleasing to God and He taught us that it atones for sins.
According to Peter Kreeft, it is no longer a straight jacket in which we think God is taking away our fun or doing it because I told you to. It becomes pleasing to detach ourselves, make a self-sacrifice, because we want to please God. Why? We cannot take the nails and suffering from Jesus. God, in His plan for our salvation, made it so His only Son can die and go through a horrible passion, to atone for all of our sins. His love is so great! If it was justice, we should be scourged and die for each one of our sins, we willfully disobey Him, knowing full well that it would hurt our relationship with Him. Who else except someone madly in love with His creation would do such a thing. (Thank you Sarah Carter!) We have a Father who has kept His promises over and over showing us His love.
We have an opportunity to fast to atone (pay for) our sins in a way that shows we love Jesus for what He did for us. God wants our yes. God wants to give us a way to pay in a very small way compared to the sacrifice Jesus made to show Him we love Him, we fast. In fasting, we slowly regain strength and begin to understand that with God’s grace we can control ourselves. We can sin less. We can grow in holiness. We can fight Satan. We can form habits that conquer sin in our lives, virtue. Most importantly, He just wants us to rest in Him, giving our sin to Him over and over. Allowing ourselves to rest in Him and recognize our sinfulness. If we don’t, we take away the power of the cross.
It requires sacrifice and suffering and at these times we remember to fall to our knees and ask God for help, prayer. The more difficult the fast, the greater suffering, the more we pray. The more we come to know our Savior and Creator and develop a relationship of love. In a growing relationship with our God, we begin to trust in His Words. We begin to understand that He continues to sacrifice Himself hidden behind bread and wine to aid us on our journey. We learn to ask for forgiveness and forgive, we begin to be healed. Oh, what a great burden is lifted when we are unchained from sin and renew our relationships.
Therefore, sacrifice and fasting brings joy. Sacrifice brings the joy of the resurrection and in the resurrection our Christian hope is found. Through God’s grace, healing, and mercy we become stronger and grow in holiness. We realize we can overcome our sin and Satan. With prayer and reflection on Jesus, the Truth, we realize the power of the Cross. When we do not fight and believe, the Cross loses it’s power. It is impossible for humans to be holy and enter heaven, but through the resurrection, through God’s grace, through our yes to God, God makes the impossible possible.
Today’s challenge: Stay true to your fast (in Lent, all Fridays throughout the year, any time you are struggling with a sin or addiction) for the love of God. Fall to your knees and beg for God’s mercy and begin to atone for your sins. Jesus died to have a relationship with us. One small ray of light entering into the hardest of hearts, can change a soul forever.
Be a servant, become a saint!
#Christian YOLO
This Shows us that fasting can mean something if your doing it for someone.
“Can the wedding guests mourn as long as the bridegroom is with them? The days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast.” I think that Jesus means that they are not fasting severely because Jesus (who is the bridegroom) is still with them. When Jesus gets crucified, the apostles will mourn and fast for him, but he is still with them so they don’t.
this time needs to be used to remember God and i haven’t been doing that.
I think Jesus was saying when He dies for us and our sins the disciples will fast and spread the word of God to thousands. Also that they will give up their lives. We need to fast and pray and spread the word of God all the time but it’s especially important during the season of Lent because we are preparing for the ultimate sacrifice that Jesus did for us.
In todays gospel God is telling me that we need to me renewed often. How do we renew? By Confession. If we want to go to Heaven we need to be renewed because God cannot put himself with us if we are not renewed.
What I learned from this gospel is that the reason why we fast is very important. The reason why we fast is because we love Jesus, and this is one the of many ways how we can show it. We fast because Jesus has given up so many things for us and we need to repay him, and that’s why we do it. We fast to show and prove our love to God, and which is way fasting is so important to us Catholics during lent.
Fasting is relying more on God. It is finding ways to be more dependent on Him. He wants us to trust Him more. By giving things up, we are sacrificing in prayer to God.
It is important to be fasting during Lent because it’s not about us it’s about Him. We need to stop being so selfish and grow up and learn that God is always with us. I know its tough to follow and times might be harder than others but you need to be determined to sacrifice yourself and some worldly object that you are addicted to.
What i think this scripture is saying is that God knows what we will do. So when we chose the devil and do wrong he pushes us to do the right. This Lent no matter what age or beliefs, We all need to thank God and appreciate what all he did for us. I’m sure all of us could say we would not just die for people, but that’s what God did for us and we as Christians and Catholics need to realize how much he loved us enough to die for us. Fasting means to give yourself up for God.
Jesus is telling us to have self-control. We don’t give up something during Lent just because the Church tells us to. We give something up because God is more important than it. We have tgo realize that. We often get lost in worldly things, but Lent is a time to get away from worldly things and get closer to God.
The purpose of Lent is for us to come closer and to grow in our relationship with Christ through fasting. The point of fasting is to show ourselves that we have self-control, and to remind us of Jesus’s sacrifice for us. I can apply this to my life by sticking to my fast and recognize God’s sacrifice for us.
We fast to come closer to Jesus. We fast to remind ourselves that Jesus had diedon a cross for us. We fast to show him that we care about what he did for us.
I think God is saying that when you are with God you have fulfilled what you do when you fast. the meaning of fasting is to become closer to God and be closer to him. when you come closer to god the more you know him.
Fasting is a way of sacrifice and a way to show we care. It helps us put for trust in God and rely on Him more. By fasting we are giving up things for something that’s greater than us.
Jesus foreshadows his death once again. We should fast because it takes us away from earthly things and puts God on our mind.
This is one of Jesus’s parables that is a little bit harder to understand. I think that he is using it to make an example out of them, like the Gospel where he speaks of the hypocrites. But I think Jesus is trying to tell us that we need not be the same as everyone else, and that we are unique. But the point of fasting is to offer things up to God.
Why should we fast just to be recognized for it? People all around the world are suffering, dying, and losing members of their families because they cannot afford to take care of them. People are being murder. Losing their homes. People are crying and mourning. Children in the womb are screaming from abortion, as if saying “what wrong have I done” what wrong have they done to deserve this?! This is why we fast. For their sake and for the sake of the ones we love. For the sake of the suffering. For the dying. For the orphans. This is why we fast! What reward is there to pretend to be good and not meaning the good that we do? What is the point? Why? If we pretend to love God then why even try? He died on a cross for our sins, so let us take up our cross and follow Him. This is our faith, and we will stand for it! We are Catholics! Let us live out this life to the fullest so that we may be redeemed! Let us spread our faith to save others. That is the point! Go out and preach the Gospel, so that we may be redeemed! Those who have ears out to hear.
I think what he is saying is that if we don’t fix our problems now they will get worse as time goes on. Eventually we won’t be able to get out of the habit if we do it for to long.
Listen to God and everything will work out.
I personally like the cloak reference. It tells us to not use an unshrunken cloth, because although it fixes the the cloak, it’s only temporary, and it can make it worse. We need to learn that we can’t fix something sloppily and think that it’ll last. We should do our best, not only thinking of now, but the future as well.
We fast because it is a way to show Jesus that we are willing to sacrifice something we love. Like God did for us.
In this Gospel it tells us that we should not fast while Jesus is with us. During lent we prepare for Jesus death and resurrection. In order to be worthy to do that we must fast. Fasting atones us for our sins. We should fast because we sin
When you fast you are basically telling God that you are sorry for my sins and putting him on the cross
We need to understand what we are doing when we fast. We need to attach our fast to sorry. We need to be sorry to Jesus. We made him suffer and die on a cross because of our sins. A lot of people don’t understand what they are doing when they fast.
We need to surrender all of our sins and faults to God. We need to submit our whole selves to God. He will take care of us and let us rest in him. He wants to take care of us and love us all the time
Jesus was scourged and died for us on a cross and we cant give up something like our phones for a couple hours? When we truly love God, we do our best to not sin and get to heaven. Fasting is important for us.
When you sacrifice you are closer to God. He knows you’re doing it for him and others. You have to remember what Jesus did for us and stay strong.
fasting is like giving up sin and after lent we dont just go and sin right as lent is over, jesus died for our sins and we try our hardest to not do what jesus saved us from.
In today’s scripture I learned why fasting is super important. It shows how much we care about and love God. When you fast don’t just do it to look cool or act like you are all that, but do it to get closer to God and build a stronger relationship. If we are going to give up something, don’t try to cheat or give up your least favorite thing. Give up something that instead of doing that thing go and pray or volunteer somewhere.
This passage today helps us understand why we fast. When you read it, it tells us why we should fast. We should fast for Jesus. He wants us to be servant for others. To fast for others and to strive to be like Him. He wants us to give up things we have for others.
We fast so that we suffer and show God that we are sorry. Jesus died because of our sins. Fasting shows that we actually care about God, and we are truly sorry for the sins we committed.
we fast to save our self to save us. Jesus died for us a small sacrifice won’t hurt. the pain Jesus went through was finally more sacrifice than we will give in our lives. give back to the person who gave everything to you.
I think this is telling us that we should fast responsibly. We should care about fasting. It is something that will help us greatly.
Fast is something that is very important. Fasting is a way of showing we care and a way of sacrificing for Jesus Christ.
What I think the scripture is saying is that we should start taking fasting more seriously, we should give something up that will get us closer to God.
Fasting, what is fasting? Fasting is where you give something up top God. although some people don’t fast when they tell God they will. During the season of lent we fast and we don’t eat meat on Friday’s so God knows that we care and respect him.
God gave us everything, his son, his love, his grace, and an infinite amount of other things. Why should we not give up something to him, just to show we care. Obviously it won’t repay Him for all His love and grace, and most especially His son, but it will show him that even in the little things, we can show our love.
I think today’s scripture passage is trying to tell us that during Lent, it is a time to learn and grow closer to God. He wants us to make sacrifices for him not just because we have to, but to allow us to come closer to Him and build a stronger relationship with him. We need to remember that fasting during Lent is not about us, it is about Jesus.
The bridegroom (Jesus) would get taken from the people. Jesus got crucified and died, the bridegroom left the wedding guests. Other people would mourn over His death, including the Disciples. Even though the Disciples would be mourning, they would have known Jesus was not truly gone. Jesus had told the Disciples that He would rise from he dead. The other people were fasting but not the Disciples because they knew the bridegroom wouldn’t leave the wedding guests.
Something that stood out to me was, “We learn to ask for forgiveness and forgive, we begin to be healed.” This has meaning because when Jesus dies He forgives us, we need to forgive others as Jesus forgives us , and we start to draw closer to God. Jesus died on the cross for all of us. He died for us; we never asked Him to die. God sent Jesus for a reason. Lent is an amazing thing. Never take that for granted.
This passage just shows that fasting and lent does have a purpose. It makes me think about my life, my sins, my struggles and how I can improve. It makes me realize how unworthy I am, and yet how loving God is to forgive me, to show me his mercy. It made me realize just how much I needed to take this season of lent in a purposeful, prayerful way.
This lent we are giving up small sacrifices for the cross, for Jesus. It is not a punishment to fast, it’s a thanks for saving us from our sin. We can grow in holiness by giving our time, talent and treasure. It’s a small sacrifice we can make.
What I think this gospel is trying to tell me is that we need to appreciate what God has done for us. We need to go to confession more so we can be forgiven by the one who matters most. He has done so much for us and we deserve none of it. We sin so much, we hurt Jesus so much and He still died for all of us and still gives us so much. He surrendered for us. He loves us and we need to truly love Him.
The more we give to God, the more we receive his grace. We have to let go of our material things so that we can give more of ourselves to God. Lent is a time for sacrifice so why don’t we sacrifice something big rather than candy?
What I think I am getting told by the Gospel is that when we fast, we are sacrificing not only to God, but with Him. We suffer with Him when he’s in the desert for 40 days and 40 nights. We do this because Jesus has done so much for us, but what have we done for Him?
Lent is for getting back into self-control. We fast to show God that we can have self-control, that we can prove to God at the we can do it. We sacrifice and fast so that we can please God, because He gave all to us, and it makes God happy. Sinning makes God sad even though Jesus gave his life away from us. So we need to grow closer and stronger to God. So that we can all go to heaven. When we don’t fight and believe, the cross loses it’s holiness.
what this scripture reflection says to me is that we need to try our best to do what we can to be with God. When we fast, we are getting closer to God. All we should want to do is get closer to God. We all need to try our best and meet God face to face, in the afterlife. He sent his only child, the most precious thing to a parent, he sent that down, and killed him. All so that the gates of heaven would be opened up for all of us to come up there and meet him.
This Lent we are not fasting candy for 40 days just to go back to it. Fasting is giving yourself up, giving your sacrifice to God. Jesus sacrificed so much for us, your parents sacrifice for you, so many people sacrifice for us, be grateful, sacrifice, pray to God this Lent really grow closer to him in your fast and prayer not just to say you did it.
The purpose for Lent is to grow closer to Christ. Lent is not a punishment or anything like that but it is about us getting closer to God. We give something up so we are reminded that Jesus died to save or from sin. Lent really makes me think about me and my life, my challenges, my struggles, my weakness, and my sins and how I can improve all of them. Lent also makes me realize that I need to be closer to God and pray everyday for those who are in need. Lent should make us realize how unworthy we are and how much we sin, but God will always forgive us, he shows us his mercy and gracefulness but we keep on sinning and sinning again and again. This lent we need to give our brokenness to Jesus so he can help us figure it out, then by the end of lent you will be closer to God.
Give your sin to Jesus. Any time you feel guilty for any action invite Jesus to help you. Any time you are struggling with keeping your Lenten fast or any time you break you fast invite Jesus into your soul again. Jesus is everywhere he is just waiting for you to invite him.
The scripture is telling me that we should always fast during the lent season. If we don’t fast we just think that it’s no big deal and that no one really cares but really God is with us all the time and he can see anything we do. Fasting is a way for us to become closer to God and it can even help us quit sinning.
What I took away from today’s gospel is that fasting has a purpose, it’s purpose is to please God, God wants us to make the choice to grow closer to him in our relationship through fasting, he knows what will make us happy, more than we know ourselves, he loves us and wants us to fast to be happy.
I think this gospel is telling me that fasting is like giving things up. Jesus gave himself up for us. So fasting is giving little things up for Jesus.
Any suffering we go through in our lives is nothing the God didn’t go through or understand. That means that you shouldn’t worry about anything you are going through and all you have to do is let God take care of it. It might be hard at first but you can do it.
Fasting is a very hard thing to do and it takes courage and faith. At one point of time in our lives after we do it because we were taught it, we wonder actually why we do it. Lent is a time of renewal and fighting our sin by fasting, praying, and believing in our actions. Once we come to realize that, everything we did was for a purpose. There will be a greater reward in heaven if we really try to let go of our sin this Lent.
This scripture is telling me that God always has a plan and that there is always a reward for fasting and suffering. We should at least be able to suffer a little bit by not sleeping with a pillow for forty days, when God gave up his son’s life just for us sinners.
We must fast when the “bridegroom” is not here. No one mourns when they are here. Fast, not to brag about it, but to grow closer to God. Let go of your sin. Surrender.
We fast for the Lord because we love him. Also its saying we just need to let go and just believe. Its also like a repayment for everything the Lord has done for us, so we should give everything of ourselves to Him.
Fasting is another way of having a better relationship with God. Fasting is a sacrifice and we need to respect and follow in Jesus footsteps to come closer with Christ
One thing that really stuck out to me from this reading was that the Pharisees seemed to be out to get Jesus. It seems like every moment that the Pharisees get, they try to tear apart Jesus and his followers to the point that they crucify Him on the cross. As followers of Jesus we have to be firm in our beliefs of God and make sure that we never stray away from God in our path to Heaven.
What I think the Gospel is saying is that when you stop worshiping God then you will be breaking away from him witch is fasting from God love/grace. So don’t leave and break your relation ship with God because he hasn’t said anything to you yet. You still need to keep your relationship that way you can go to haven and live a happy life.
Every time you sin you are preventing yourself from growing closer to God. You can’t grow closer to Him if you keep sinning and doing the same sin over and over again. You are no longer hurting yourself but also hurting God. We need God and we need to grow closer to become better people.
To me this gospel is saying that we are so ungrateful for all of the gifts God has given us. We seem to forget that we mean absolutely nothing compared to him. He is so important and we are so unimportant. We think we have the right to not have to fast, but that is so wrong of us. We don’t deserve to get out of fasting, and we don’t even deserve to have the option to not fast. We are unworthy and we need to get that engraved into our minds.
We must fast and sacrifice for the Lord because we love him and for all he has done for us. The more that we give/give up for God, the more we receive from him.
This scripture is telling me that giving up say candy or icecream is only for 40 days.I think it is more than that it is to give something to God and show him that you are worthy to him.So you can enter into heaven with you.
In todays Scripture Jesus is telling us to fast and to be like him. like how he fast forty days and forty nights. We need to listen to him and fast to we can give jesus are sin or self sacrifice. Thats why we need to fast and pray
Fasting is difficult. The purpose of fasting isn’t so we can be recognized or to have people feel sorry for us it’s to show God we love Him.
We fast during lent because of Jesus’s suffering so we suffer small sacrifices for him. We need to show him that we can give anything up because we won’t have phones, video games, and social media in Heaven. Lent is also about gaining and learning self control.
As Catholics we are supposed to fast. But how many of us if we did not have our parents telling us we have to fast or we can not eat meat on Fridays during lent would eat meat or would not fast. I’m sure that it would be more than just a couple. The reason that we fast is because Jesus went 40 days and 40 nights without food or water while being tempted. But he always said no to the temptations. Lent is about praising God, so that is what we should be doing every single day. because then we will be so much happier and have an amazing relationship with him. We hurt Jesus every single day by sinning. But if we have that relationship with God then we can have the strength to say no. Jesus is always there waiting for us. So let this lent be the one where you come back to God and have an amazing relationship with him.
Today’s Scripture passage says that Lent is very important. We should fast for God because He cares so much about us and loves us very much. Fasting shows us that we are doing it for a purpose and to show that we can do anything with and for Christ. We should pray to Him to become closer in Him and gives us someone to rely on and someone to go to with our struggles. We should give/serve to help us be more like Jesus and become a better person. We need to let go of our sin(s) by going to Confession, so that we don’t have that held against us. It will create an even better relationship with Him.
Every Lent we don’t fast for ourselves, we fast for God. We need to depend on God while we fast.
In this Gospel it tells us that we should not fast while Jesus is with us. During lent we prepare for Jesus death and resurrection. In order to be worthy to do that we must fast. Fasting atones us for our sins. We should fast because we sin.
that jesus love us
God loves us so much that He sent Jesus and Jesus died for us. We have to fast to grow closer to God.
Why do we fast? Simple, we fast not because God wants us to, but because we need to get away from our Earthly possessions and look towards Heaven.
I think today’s scripture is saying, that when you have Jesus in your life in Spirit instead of in Heaven with him fast until the day you can meet him in Heaven. For when you do you will be complete with not only Him but the Father as well.
Lent is a time for recognition and reflection of how much Jesus loves us. He loves us so much that he did for our sins. He did and forgave us for all the times we had hurt him. There is nobody else more merciful than God. No matter how big the sin is, God always chooses to forgive us. He only wants the best for us so that we can get to heaven.
I think that the disciples are already fasting with Jesus, because they are without there family’s and that is almost like they are giving something up just to be with God. The Pharisees don’t get that though because they only think of themselves and will not think about what other people are doing.
We fast to show that we love God and all that He has done for us. This is also telling us that no matter what happens we always need to be with God. Jesus died on the cross for us and so giving up a something will mean so much to God.
what i think this is saying is that when we fast it is a sacrifice. Jesus sacrificed his life for us, so that we could be here on earth today. making a small sacrifice like fasting during lent is nothing. nothing compared to the sacrifice Jesus Christ made for us. the sacrifice of fasting that we make is nothing compared to what Jesus did. there may be pain and suffering along the way but Jesus suffered more than we ever will. we are making this small sacrifice for him because he made a sacrifice for us and he is the reason that we are here today. we need to make this sacrifice to honor Jesus the one who saved us.
Why should we fast? Well the reason is to repay for our sins. We need to fast so we can repay for our sins or else we risk going to Hell. Fasting also isn’t just a thing us Catholics do. It is a sacrifice.
A phrase in the gospel is why do we and the Pharisees fast much,but your disciples do not fast? The disciples did not have to fast because they gave everything away for just for the loving God. Another reason is that God wants us to give up our earthly things.
The Gospel taught me that we can fast as a sacrifice to Jesus. Jesus sacrificed everything for us, even his life. Jesus sacrificed his life for us; the sinners. We can sin time and time again, but Jesus will always love us. If we were the last person on Earth, Jesus would still die for us.
The disciples asked Jesus why do the paraseas fast but the disciples dont. It’s kinda like why do we fast. Jesus is with us always and will always. Fasting is for getting away from electronics our bad words and sin.
This scripture brings so many powerful meanings. I think today’s scripture is trying to tell us that during the time of Lent, it is a time to grow closer to God and learn. God wants us to make different sacrifices for him not just because we are forced to or have to, but because it allows us to grow closer to him and build a strong relationship with him. We always need to remember that fasting during Lent is not about us, it is about the true savior.
I think this scripture is about that we will should surrender our sin because we try to always be independent. we should trust in God.
God will always love us. We fast for him because we love Him. We aren’t fasting for ourselves, we are doing this for Him. To thank and repay Him.
Fasting shows God that we can do it, that we can grow in our faith for him. We fast because we love God. It shows that we appreciate him and what he has given us.
Today’s scripture is showing us that we need God. In several ways. We cant just keep sinning over and over again and expect a different out come just in a new situation. Jesus teaches us about this to prove He is the only one that is good for us.
In today’s scripture we see that God wants us to be with him and mourn. He also explains to us why we should fast and If we do fast or give up anything we need to find the Joy in it like Jesus did.
I think that Jesus is basically saying that the disciples cannot be miserable when they are in his presence. So the reason they don’t fast is because Jesus is great and even in His presence the disciple don’t fast so like the wine skins both of them can be preserved.
I think the scripture is telling us to fast. I mean it is Lent. Why not fast? People who do not fast are risking their faith. The more we fast , the better our odds of going to heaven.