![\"cress-1258124_640\"](\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/333\/2017\/03\/cress-1258124_640.jpg\")
<\/p>\nYears past, I have rejected the notion of giving things up for Lent. I adhere more to the practice of adding a discipline TO my life, rather than the discipline of taking something away. The act of self-denial has always felt a little pious and inauthentic to me. Fine for other folks, if that works for them; but for me, nothing has ever felt meaningful enough to purge. I mean, in the grand scheme of the suffering of the world, what does it matter if I give up chocolate or t.v.?<\/p>\n
But I find myself in a different posture this year. My hunch is, it has a lot to do with the social and political climate in which we find ourselves. Mercy, I need to shake off the dust. I need a fast that will leave me feeling lighter. An unwinding of the spirit, and unloading of the baggage.<\/p>\n
Many friends are taking a social media fast for the season, to take a break from all the anxiety and rage. I hear that.\u00a0But for a blogger and a pastor, that kind of feels like giving up a pulpit. So, here I am.<\/p>\n
What I\u2019m giving up instead? Meat. And shopping.<\/p>\n
These may sound like arbitrary things, but both are intentional. To the first point\u2013my daughter (now 8) has been a vegetarian since age 4. Pretty much the minute she figured out what it was, she started saying I DON\u2019T EAT MEAT, and commenced subsisting mostly on fruit, bread and cheese. Thing is, while I find it personally difficult to give up cheeseburgers\u2013I dearly love cheeseburgers, not to mention a good steak\u2013I very much admire her conviction. It is a deeply held part of her faith and being, and one that came from her own little self and not the adults in the house.<\/p>\n
I\u2019m learning\u00a0more and more that, of all the imminent threats to our environment, the carnivorous habits of Americans may be the most destructive. Basically, if the whole planet ate as much meat as we did, we\u2019d all be screwed. Not just because of diminishing\u00a0supply, but because of the negative impact of production, packaging, and transportation. While the earth can provide more than enough, it does not hold unlimited stores of everything.<\/p>\n
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To the second thing\u2013let\u2019s just be clear right off that I\u2019ve never been a person who goes shopping for fun. Shopping is not a recreational thing for me. It is a tedious journey of sensory overload through crowds of people that make me an anxious hot mess. Close to the holidays, I nest in and refuse to venture near a mall or big box store. What I buy, I buy mostly online, with maybe a once-a-year trek to the outlet mall. On like a Monday morning in the dead of winter when NOBODY else will be there.<\/p>\n
That being said\u2013my husband recently went back to work full-time after 5 years as a stay-home dad. And suddenly\u2013we\u2019ve got like, cash-flow. Not a lot, but noticeably more than we\u2019re used to. So we\u2019ve been buying all the things<\/em>. Things we\u2019ve put off buying for years\u00a0on a single paycheck. From new shoes to new appliances to living room furniture (y\u2019all\u2013our couch was so awful we literally couldn\u2019t give it away). All things considered, it feels like we\u2019ve been on a binge. At least, relative to our usually minimalist relationship with stuff. These are all things we can mostly justify \u201cneeding,\u201d but still. It feels not only like the credit card could use a rest\u2026 It feels like I<\/em> could use a rest\u2013from the time and mental energy spent thinking about, and looking for, replacements for our old falling apart stuff.<\/p>\n So for the next 40 days, I\u2019m not buying anything except for groceries. Vegetarian\u00a0<\/em>groceries at that. (Wine doesn\u2019t have meat in it, right? So I\u2019ll survive).\u00a0If my kids have another growth spurt, we will dig through the closet for whatever hand-me-downs we have in the next size up. If I accidentally wander into a great book store, too bad, my money is no good\u00a0there. And if Patagonia has a great web sale? Just don\u2019t tell me about it.<\/p>\n In abstaining from meat, and stuff, I repent. I repent of the mindless consumption that ignores the source from which our things derive\u2013and the path by which those things reach us. And I repent of the time and energy spent on things that do not have a heartbeat; time better spent on people. I repent and recognize that if I am not mindful about what I consume, then it will consume me.<\/p>\n Maybe you can relate.<\/p>\n While I, and I alone, am accountable for the sins inherent in my consumptive habits, there is also a direct correlation between our consumer culture and the larger societal\u00a0crisis in which we find ourselves right now. We just elected a reality tv star as President<\/em>, which tells you something pretty profound about what we value. I may not have voted for him personally, but I am certainly complicit in the world that made him. His\u00a0only mark of success is in the things he owns\u2013and we elevated him to the highest office in the land. In spite of his glaring character flaws and lack of experience, the appealing thing about him, for many, was the tax cut that he promised to the middle class. No matter what services that may diminish for the poor;\u00a0no matter that his racist rhetoric is already yielding real life consequences; if he can save us $1200 a year and some change, then hey, we\u2019ll have more money to buy stuff. That\u2019s a lot of cheese burgers. That\u2019s a lot of made in China shoes.<\/p>\n May God have mercy on us.<\/p>\n So, there you have it. My sack cloth and ashes. It may not be much, in the grand scheme of the suffering world. But for right now, for just this time in my life and the world, this is the fast I choose. To consume less. To require less. To reset some of my rhythms to be more in sync\u00a0with God\u2019s time;\u00a0to change my relationship with stuff. And most of all, to resist the siren song of \u201cmore, more, more;\u201d which is the greatest threat to our economy, our national security, and in fact, our very souls.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Years past, I have rejected the notion of giving things up for Lent. I adhere more to the practice of adding a discipline TO my life, rather than the discipline of taking something away. The act of self-denial has always felt a little pious and inauthentic to me. Fine for other folks, if that works […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1154,"featured_media":4790,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[635,82,10,177,1428],"class_list":["post-4789","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-faith-and-community","tag-ash-wednesday","tag-lent","tag-spirituality","tag-sustainability","tag-vegetarian"],"yoast_head":"\n