What is “Fasting” All About?!

It is about the blessing of suffering. Why is it a blessing?! It is a blessing for a couple of reasons. First, it allows us to have a more real connection with the suffering that Christ took during the passion (as detailed [at least] in the Sorrowful Mysteries of the Holy Rosary). Second, for whatever we’re fasting for it brings the topic to be more direct as it will allow you to focus more deeply.

One thing I decided to commit to is the pledge to fast, at least once a month of water and bread only for 24 hours, for the purpose as detailed at e5men.org.

Fasting is not as “crazy” or “outlandish” as some may think. It is actually part of Catholicism and Christianity that seems to be ignored except for Lent. It is a healthy spiritual practice for stronger prayer and penance, which brings us closer to God and helps pay for your sins now on earth instead of in purgatory.

To quote the “Catechism of the Catholic Church”, 2043:

The fourth precept (”You shall observe the days of fasting and abstinence established by the Church”) ensures the times of ascesis and penance which prepare us for the liturgical feasts and help us acquire mastery over our instincts and freedom of heart.

Here are some interesting quotes from http://www.scripturecatholic.com/fasting.html:

Psalm 35:13 - David says, “I afflicted myself with fasting.” David recognized that fasting drew him closer to God. Fasting makes us aware of our dependency on God.

Esther 4:3,16 - people fasted for days to atone for sin. Although Jesus remits the eternal penalty of our sin, we can atone for temporal penalties due to our sin.

Tobit 12:8 - prayer is good when accompanied by fasting. Throughout salvation history, God has encouraged fasting to be coupled with prayer.

Acts 13:2-3; 14:23 - the apostles engaged in prayer and fasting in connection with ordaining leaders of the Church. Prayer and fasting have always been the practice of the Church.

Luke 2:37 - Anna the widow worshiped God with fasting and prayer night and day. The Church has always taught that, by virtue of our priesthood conferred in baptism, our fasting participates in the priesthood of Christ by atoning for the temporal punishments due to our and other people’s sins.

It is very helpful for me. I will be fasting of just water and tuna (bread is not horrible to me as I’m have a low-carb eating lifestyle), just keeping tuna down is difficult.

If you are like me and are struggling with sin or just want to come closer to God, give fasting a try. If you are married or not, check out e5men.org.

Suffering is a blessing, not meant to cause you harm. It is not pleasant, yet make the most of your time here on Earth. All it takes it one try… just be sure to pray, even more than normal during this time.

For review, here are the Sorrowful Mysteries of the Holy Rosary:

Tuesdays and Fridays. Also Sundays in Lent.

1. The Agony of Our Lord in the Garden. Reading: Luke 22: 39-46.

2. The Scourging of Our Lord at the Pillar. Reading: Mark 15: 6-15.

3. The Crowning of Our Lord with Thorns. Reading: John 19: 1-8.

4. The Carrying of the Cross. Reading: John 19: 16-22.

5. The Crucifixion and Death of Our Lord. Reading: John 19: 25-30.

Photo credit ©2006 Br Lawrence Lew, O.P.

Flickr 365days Project

Update: Ok, I ended up dropping out of the project, it was just too much to keep up with. May give it another go eventually someday… (priorities, etc).

I decided to join the Flickr.com 365 Days project. Here is a bit more about the group as defined in the rules.

The 365 Days group is a project in which members submit one self portrait each day for a year.

All of the rules are right there in that one sentence, but it seems to confuse so many folks, so we’ll elaborate a bit:

A self portrait is a photo of yourself taken by you - it is not a photo of you taken by someone else and it is not a photo of something you hold near and dear to your heart. Please don’t try to interpret ’self portrait’ into something drastically different than what it is.

You are only allowed to submit one photo for each day. Only one. Feel free to do whatever you want to do within your own 365 Days set, but only send one to the pool.

You should plan on taking a shot every day for a year. If you miss one or two days, that’s fine. If your camera breaks and you miss an entire month, we’re not gonna kick you out. But if you take a self portrait once every five weeks and send it to this group along with every other self portrait group on Flickr, your photo will be removed.

It seems interesting very interest and there are a lot of amazing photographs taken by people. I hope to be able to come up with interesting pictures over time. I also like the commitment of doing something everyday for 365 days. That’s great!

So, hope something good comes out of it. Here is my set for the group: http://www.flickr.com/photos/unixfudotnet/sets/72157604739863841/.

It’s already becoming difficult to come up with something interesting. Maybe that’s where cool stuff comes from?! I don’t know, I’m not an artistic person, yet would like to be.

Drop it like it’s… Tetris?!

“Drop it like it’s hot” rap song remixed to include the Tetris arcade game song. It’s really inventive.

Want this Rosary

I want this Rosary, yet it is on back order till the end of July. Shucks. It looks pretty darn awesome though.

10 Most Popular Commands

(used on my workstation)

~ >> history | perl -MData::Hash::Totals -ane'$x{$F[1]}++;' -e'END{print as_table(\%x, comma => 1)}' | head
115 ssh
 73 ls
 46 cd
 25 ping
 24 scp
 23 df
 21 host
 18 ./bin/sshtunnel.sh
 15 rm
 11 fg

Shown one-liner on Mechanix.
“sshtunnel.sh” just sets up a ssh socks4 proxy tunnel.
My workstation is truly a workstation, I bounce to other places most the time. I even bounce to VMware Fusion images.

Pray More; Pray for Others

A message I got from last Sunday’s Mass (forth Sunday of Easter) was that I needed to pray more and pray for others. I also got this message from a friend of mine. We’ve prayed together twice and it’s super awesome. We prayed the Rosary together last night, even though I was not totally with it from lack of sleep it was really great.

Praying for others is growing to be part of my prayers; some I stick prayers on at the end on almost every time I pray. God is love, it is great to pray for others and try to show this unselfish love. There is something really great about praying for others for me. It is a total unselfish act. Sure, I may tell others that I will pray for them sometimes, yet it is more to help them than build up some selfish ego of prayer awesomeness.

I know I need to pray more. It is kind of interesting how it works out. The more I struggle and work to follow God’s path and do the right thing, it is easier to pray. It is now easier to be humble and just be willing to speak with God, it’s almost exciting at times. Praying is opening a channel with God, Jesus, The Holy Spirit and all the Saints, which is beautiful. It isn’t about having the prayers answered really (though that is nice), it is more about the line of personal communication.

I am working more to pray for others, there are many people that are asking for prayer and also people in my life I want to pray for (even if they didn’t ask). It something I am becoming more conscious of now and I have faith that it is doing some good. God has his own plan, yet praying for his help and for him to touch those that feel that he’s forgotten them is a great thing.

Sometimes it is easy to pray, other times it is not as much. Mainly because I am not a Saint, that I still struggle with my old ways that I am trying to break. The old thought patterns and old habits, all get in the way. The first step is just recognizing them as they happen or before they happen. I do pray more naturally now and it doesn’t feel awkward at all.

I hope that I can get more strong in prayer over time, and that my future wife and family will be able to pray together. We could all realize and enjoy the love of God; helping bring each other closer to heaven with our time here that has been gifted to us.

The power of prayer is really profound, yet not in some mystical magical sort of way. It is profound as it brings us closer to God, and is a way learning God’s love so that we may know love of each other.

Photo credit ©2008 SteffanyZphotgraphy.

New Bike I Want

Trek Urban 2.0.

Bears. Beets. Battlestar Galactica.

One of my favorite skits on “The Office” (US).

Macbook and Tea

A glimpse into my workspace at home. Got my Macbook that is my the real computer I use (as a workstation). I also got some tea, “Irish Breakfast”, which is pretty good. I am a bachelor and I like tv-trays as portable tables.

Struggle and Prayer

The more I learn about Catholicism and the teachings of Christ and the Church, the more I know of my own sin and shortcomings. Being aware of them is wonderful, yet working to correct them and do the right thing in my life is a hard struggle.

Prayer is becoming more a part of my life, I just need help. I tend to ask for strength all the time as it is just too much for me a lot of the time to manage. I know I’m not the only one that is struggling to be the good person that God wants us to be. I think that all practicing Catholics (or Protestants even ;)) deal with this problem.

One of our greatest gifts from God is free will, yet it is also what makes this so difficult. The more I learn about myself, the more it is difficult.

Can you relate?

Photo credit ©2005 David Nelson

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