Belly Button Lent, Part I

We are nearing the final hours of Fat Tuesday and I'm doing my best to polish off the cooler-full of beer residing on my front porch. I've put a lot more thought into this year's lenten discipline than I ever have before, but there's still time where I could change my mind, or maybe come up with something better. For the next hour or so, I have the luxury of giving up anything I want without having to actually deal with the consequences of my choice.......until tomorrow.

I've always thought fasting was rather lame, probably because I have such a deep connection with my stomach. I would never think of robbing it of what it rightly deserves. And if fasting is it's own end, then I still think it's lame. But I'm beginning to see the possibility that it doesn't have to be about starving yourself until God gives you what you want, like some big baby throwing a tantrum. For someone like myself, it is an easy thing to make some monumental decision and then go about my day like nothing had happened, and not think of it again until a week later. And I think this is the problem I've always had with Lent. I go through the Ash Wednesday service then wander about the rest of the day with soot on my face, and I wonder why people are staring at me. I need things to surround me and remind me of what I'm doing. I can't stay inside the church all the time, and I certainly can't carry off their icons to gaze upon endlessly, but what if there were actions that I performed in my daily life, that I could do a little differently, just to remind myself that I'm supposed to be focused elsewhere. And this is where fasting comes in (or *might* come in, I should say....I'm delaying decisions here). Unlike giving up something minor that I might only eat every once in a while, changing something significant about my diet that would require me to pause, think, and make a different choice regularly throughout the day could be a very real help. And not because I'd be a healthier person if I didn't drink sodas or eat fatty foods; that would just be deflecting from the much bigger (and scarier) motive of connecting with God on a real level.

So once I've gotten my body's undivided attention, then what? Yippee! I'm starvin' for Jesus! That just seems silly. I imagine some sort of ritual prayer, a verbal recognition of my own mortality and of God's infiniteness, to put myself in proper perspective within the rest of the world. Hunger pangs could then be a prayer tool, something to center myself with, and even be able to focus better on that part of my soul that needs to heal.

And..........time's up. I still don't have it all ironed out. Happy Lent everybody! I'll be thinking about you around breakfast time :)