"Breaking" Lent

[BabyDoll4]

I gave up sugar for Lent (best thing I have ever done so far). We are celebrating our sons first Birthday tomorrow. Is it ok to break my Lent Commitment so I can enjoy cake with the family?

 

[Olrac]

I think you can have some birthday cake because God dosent expect people to be perfect all throughout lent. He wants you to make an effort to make your life better and to become healthier. And from what you wrote you have been making an effort. But to make up for eating sweets I would do some extra service, help others more and do some extra praying to make up for breaking the promise.

 

[Allegra]

There isn’t a “rule” about this sort of thing. We’re supposed to abstain from meat on Fridays and fast on Good Friday. The rest is a personal devotion. Pray about it and ask the Holy Spirit what you should do. I think it’s reasonable to make some exceptions or substitutions to things you are giving up and on special occasions. On the other hand, I think it’s perfectly possible to enjoy a birthday party without eating cake. Your son’s not going to notice and say, “My party was ruined because Ma didn’t have a piece of cake!” So really, it’s between you and God.

 

[Allegra]

He wants you to make an effort to make your life better and to become healthier

I’m pretty sure that isn’t the purpose of Lent. If it was about making healthier nutritional choices, then we’d be expected to do it all year, not for six weeks. Besides that, in the old days, people often gave up things that were actually beneficial to their health. Giving up meat for them was actually subtracting essential protein from a diet that was frequently lacking in protein. When they fasted, the food they gave up was often just enough to get by. They did it anyway for penitential purposes, not to lose weight. It’s only in our current, modern culture, were we are constantly satiated with an excess of food that we got the idea that Christ instituted Lent to help us watch our waistline.

 

[Crusaderbear]

Do an alternate devotion for the day. Don’t drink coffee or something for the day…its between you and God.

 

[Dorothy]

I gave up sugar for Lent (best thing I have ever done so far). We are celebrating our sons first Birthday tomorrow. Is it ok to break my Lent Commitment so I can enjoy cake with the family?

It is my understanding that Sunday is not officially included in Lent, although some may wish to do so.

 

[PaulinVA]

It is my understanding that Sunday is not officially included in Lent, although some may wish to do so.

This is the answer. Count up the days. Sundays are not included, because Sundays are always day of rejoicing.

 

[Chatter163]

As others have said, this is a personal devotion, so you are free to do what you wish. My feeling is that occasions such as birthdays, especially others’ birthdays, that fall during Lent pose the greatest opportunity to practice self-denial. While it is true that Sundays are not part of Lent per se, I don’t partake of sweets on those days, either, because then the self-denial to me doesn’t seem like much. When one can always have sweets (or whatever else) within a few days, the sacrifice just doesn’t seem that difficult. It also makes Easter even sweeter, pardon the pun. But that’s just me.

 

[Allegra]

This is the answer. Count up the days. Sundays are not included, because Sundays are always day of rejoicing.

A priest told me once that he didn’t think one should fast or due penitence on Sundays for that reason.

 

[BabyDoll4]

Thank you for your replies. There have been other special days where I did not take sweets and I’ve been going beyond just the traditional cookies, cake and such. I’ve been reading labels too. Anyway, I thought I had read that Sunday’s were not included in the day count. So I’ll think and pray about it. Again, thank you for your replies!

 

[babochka]

This is the answer. Count up the days. Sundays are not included, because Sundays are always day of rejoicing.

While Sundays are not included in the count for the 40 days of Lent, they are liturgically part of the Lenten season; in other words, Sundays are part of Lent. The lectionary contains the readings for “The First Sunday in Lent, The Second Sunday in Lent”, etc. Penitential vestment colors are worn, the Alleluia and the Gloria are omitted from the Mass, the liturgical tone is subdued, and flowers are not allowed to decorate the altar. If Sundays were not part of Lent, it would make no sense to treat them any differently from any other Sunday.

While fasting (reducing the amount of food eaten) has traditionally been forbidden on Sundays, that doesn’t mean that it is wrong to continue our personal Lenten sacrifices on Sunday, if we are so inclined.

Personal Lenten sacrifices are a way to train ourselves in self-denial. If we can learn to deny ourselves in little things, we will be better able to deny our desires when faced with temptation to sin. I think we have to ask ourselves what would best serve this purpose.

Edit: While looking for a source to quote, I came across this. Fr. Z said it better than I did. wdtprs.com/blog/2012/02/quaeritur-are-sundays-part-of-lent/

During Holy Mass yesterday, for the 1st Sunday of Lent, I read (in the Extraordinary Form) about abstinence (in the Collect), fasting (in the Epistle), the Lord fasting (in the Gospel), fasting and refraining from bodily pleasures (in the Secret), bodily fasting and curbing vices (in the Preface) … get the point? This is for the Sunday Mass.
Sundays of Lent are also imbued with a penitential spirit, though we can see that Sunday, being an echo of Easter, isn’t going to be as penitential as, for example, Friday.
As far as the “forty” is concerned the days of Lent are forty, excluding the Sundays. The Triduum is also apart. But the whole season, from Ash Wednesday on, is Lent.
The joy of a Sunday during Lent has to be penitential joy, or rather joyful penitence.
The Sundays of Lent do not have a Gloria or Alleluia. Perhaps that should be reflected in our lives and meals as well? There are the Solemnities of St. Joseph and of the Annunciation, which liturgically have the Gloria, though not the Alleluia. Take your cue from that. We are not obliged to do penance on solemnites. However, we are still within the penitential season of Lent.
We celebrate these solemnities, but let us not forget that it is Lent.
Moreover, even if on a Sunday we decide to relax somewhat our penitential physical mortification, we can perhaps perform even more corporal and spiritual works of mercy. Some people have a custom of feeding the poor on the Feast of St. Joseph.
St. Pope Leo the Great in sermons on Lent reveals that for our ancient Roman forebears people fasted and abstained and cut back on what was necessary, not on what was in excess, so that they could give the difference to the poor.
We can have some festive joy, but perhaps the best way to preserve our penitential spirit on these exceptions to the rule is to engage in corporal and spiritual works of mercy.

 

[corsair]

Sundays are NOT Fast/Abstinence days. So, as others have said, enjoy the day and have a piece of cake. But its back at it on Monday.

 

[Olrac]

I’m pretty sure that isn’t the purpose of Lent. If it was about making healthier nutritional choices, then we’d be expected to do it all year, not for six weeks.

God would not expect us to give something up all year. He knows that we are not perfect. Thats why During lent we make better choices, it may be chosing to give up soda in hopes that after lent we can cut back on soda or sweets or whatever you gave up. Lent is not only giving things up its also about adding things on like prayer and service to others.

 

[Allegra]

God would not expect us to give something up all year. He knows that we are not perfect. Thats why During lent we make better choices, it may be chosing to give up soda in hopes that after lent we can cut back on soda or sweets or whatever you gave up. Lent is not only giving things up its also about adding things on like prayer and service to others.

What are you talking about? God expects us to give up all sorts of things all year! Lying, gossip, extramarital sex, violence, hate, avarice, etc. The purpose of Lent isn’t to “make better choices” so that we can feel free to make poor choices the rest of the year. It’s to sacrifice something worldly that isn’t in and of itself a sin, but to offer it as a sacrifice to bring you closer to God. You are right in your last statement though.

 

[Wesrock]

Lent is about becoming less wordly and more spiritual. It’s also about penance and repentence. If by improving ourselves we mean focusing less on this world and more on God, then yes, Lent is about improving ourselves. But it’s not a matter of improving ourselves in ways that are worldly. Lent, in a way, is a call to a bit more ascetisim by all the faithful.

Aside from the abstainance and fasting rules that the Church has during Lent, your penance is a personal devotion, not a strict mandate. It’s up to you to determine the appropriate implementation and limits.