I never really fully understood the purpose of \u201cgiving up\u201d something for Lent.\u00a0 As a child, growing up in the Catholic religion, I just simply did it because I was told I was supposed to do it, never really grasping the intent of this long-held ritual.\u00a0 However, I guess in some way, from the perspective of a child, I approached it as a personal challenge just to see if I could<\/i> do it, but always wondering why God would want me to give up pizza or chocolate, which were my two favorite \u201cthings\u201d as a young child; and, therefore, the two things that I must forgo during Lent.\u00a0 Because, as we all know, in order to truly<\/i> be in God\u2019s favor, you must give up something that you love<\/i>, some object or experience that would cause you to suffer in the absence of that particular thing. \u00a0And as a very small child, pizza and chocolate had grown to be my \u201cloves\u201d in the universe of my short and tender years.<\/p>\n
Fast-forward now 40 years later, while I understand the history behind the Lenten season, I still remain unclear as to the purpose of giving up \u201csomething you love\u201d in the 40 days that fall between Ash Wednesday and Easter\u2026or at ANY time<\/i>.\u00a0 At this point in my life, it has become abundantly clear to me that I experience more joy, more peace, and more of a knowing Who I Really Am when I align myself with that which is<\/i> serving me <\/i>and to change what is not<\/i>.\u00a0 Why would God desire, or actually command,<\/i> me to remove experiences from my life that bring me joy?\u00a0 Must the path to God be traveled on a road of suffering?\u00a0 Why have we imagined a God who manipulates love in such a way?<\/p>\n
Lent is not the only example of how we, as a society, have bought into an idea of forgoing and suffering as a path to The Creator.\u00a0 There are Yogis who live in the Himalayan Mountains who devote their existence to a life of renunciation, abandoning material comforts and even food in their pursuit of spiritual enlightenment.\u00a0 It is commonly known that Catholic priests refrain from not only sex, but they resist even entering into a romantic relationship with another based on a belief that it will allow them to better serve and please God.\u00a0 People who observe the Jewish and Seventh Day Adventist faiths abstain from eating pork and shellfish because of beliefs they hold about what God wants. Those who belong to the Jehovah Witness faith will not celebrate birthdays, nor will they even receive a blood transfusion in medical emergencies, because of beliefs they hold about what God wants.\u00a0 Many women in the Pentecostal faith will not cut their hair because of beliefs they hold about what God wants….just to name a few.<\/p>\n
Now, an idea that I could<\/i> more readily embrace would be engaging in 40 days of placing intention on the things that foster our ability to realize and actually experience our Highest Selves and our ever-present connection with God.\u00a0 I can remember no time in my life where the deprivation of something I love has led to an experience of knowing God.\u00a0 I can, however, recite numerous occasions where allowing the things I love to flow into my life abundantly most certainly and vividly created a deeper understanding and knowing of Who I Am and what my relationship with God is.<\/p>\n
This idea of suffering has long been misunderstood and misused as a way to \u201cwin\u201d or \u201cearn\u201d God\u2019s love.\u00a0 We are pained to see the visible suffering in the world around us, but we are quick to voluntarily suffer in an effort to seek approval and acceptance from the one source of unconditional love that we actually<\/i> have.\u00a0 Why do so few embrace an idea that we do not have to do anything to receive God\u2019s love<\/i>?\u00a0 Is that thought too frightening?\u00a0 Is that concept too easy?\u00a0 Is that idea too risky?\u00a0 Would we<\/i> place that expectation on our own<\/i> children in order that they may experience our<\/em> love?<\/p>\n After all, we are making it all up here, aren\u2019t we?<\/p>\n Why are we making it up in a way that feels so hard?<\/p>\n (Lisa McCormack is the Managing Editor & Administrator of The Global Conversation.\u00a0 She is also a member of the Spiritual Helper team at <\/i>www.ChangingChange.net<\/i><\/a>, a website offering emotional and spiritual support. To connect with Lisa, please e-mail her at <\/i>Lisa@TheGlobalConversation.com<\/i><\/span><\/a><\/span>.)<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I never really fully understood the purpose of \u201cgiving up\u201d something for Lent.\u00a0 As a child, growing up in the Catholic religion, I just simply did it because I was told I was supposed to do it, never really grasping the intent of this long-held ritual.\u00a0 However, I guess in some way, from the perspective […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[157],"tags":[166,967,966,963,231,968,964,965],"class_list":["post-4163","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-romance-and-relationships","tag-catholic","tag-forgoing","tag-gods-love","tag-lent","tag-lisa-mccormack","tag-religions","tag-renunciation","tag-suffering"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theglobalconversation.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4163","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theglobalconversation.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theglobalconversation.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theglobalconversation.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theglobalconversation.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4163"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"https:\/\/www.theglobalconversation.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4163\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4172,"href":"https:\/\/www.theglobalconversation.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4163\/revisions\/4172"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theglobalconversation.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4163"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theglobalconversation.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4163"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theglobalconversation.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4163"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}