Did I sin by fasting on a Monday?

[Nelka]

I wanted to try to fast and abstain more as I cannot make a full day I was trying to get to 3pm a few days per week but in the Didache it states:

1. Let not your fasts be with the hypocrites, for they fast on Mondays and Thursdays, but do you fast on Wednesdays and Fridays.

Thanks.

 

[Onestepahead]

No, you didn’t sin by fasting on a Monday; please don’t be so hard on yourself. Any fasting, even when you fast a small amount, by not taking seconds or having dessert, is good!

 

[Xanthippe_Voorhees]

I have a feeling this is taken vastly out of context.

Fasting is good. We aim to do it on Wednesdays and Fridays because they are days that allow us to grow closer to Christ. But we fast during lent, (with the exceptions of Sundays) and that includes Mondays.

 

[Tis_Bearself]

It’s not a sin. The Fatima kids and many saints fasted a lot, all the time, in reparation for sins and to save souls.

Also, while we are not required to believe in private revelation, Elizabeth Kindelmann who founded the Flame of Love movement said she was told by Jesus that fasting on Monday can free the souls of priests form purgatory. She also fasted on other days of the week (I think Friday was the day to free souls of your own deceased family members).
So sometimes I fast on Monday to try and help the deceased priests’ souls.

God bless

 

[Usagi]

Presumably, at the time the Didache was written, there was a particular group known for fasting on Mondays and Thursdays, and the writer(s) of the Didache did not want their followers confused or lumped in with those folks. I don’t know if we have any other documentary evidence from the time period to explain what that was all about, or if it must remain mysterious to us.

It definitely does not mean that fasting on Monday is a sin for all time, though. It’s dangerous enough to take certain passages of Scripture as literal instructions to us personally, and this is a work of similar age without even the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. If we have no idea who “those guys we don’t like, who fast on Mondays” even ARE, the instruction to not be confused with them probably doesn’t apply to us.