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Link0126
Guest
The guidelines are one small meal and two small snacks not one large meal and two small meals.
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Shin
Guest
I’ve enjoyed listening to that sermon.
‘Is what is put before you not sufficient? How are you going to make war on passion if you are defeated by a cabbage? You will become weaker than a feather if you do not fortify yourself by thought through self-mastery.’
St. Theodore the Studite
"St. Makarios of Alexandria did not practice just one form of asceticism, but different kinds: if he heard that a certain struggler had performed one kind of asceticism, he was eager not only to succeed in it, but to surpass that individual. When he learned from someone that the Tabennesiotans ate uncooked food throughout the Great Fast, he forbade himself to use fire in preparing food for seven years; he would eat only raw vegetables and, if he could find any, moistened legumes.
Subsequently he heard from someone else that a certain Elder ate only one 320 grams of bread; he thus broke up the ration of hard bread that he had, placed the bread in a jar, and decided to eat every day only as much as his hand could extract from it. He used to relate to us jokingly: “I got hold of quite a few morsels, but I could not remove them all, since the neck of the jar was too narrow. The tax-collector – that is the weakness of the flesh – does not permit me to forgo food completely.”
After that for three years he imposed this abstinence on himself: he would eat four or five ungiai [27 grams] of bread and drink a corresponding amount of water."
- from the sayings of the desert fathers
“If you have resolved to fast, do not plead illness as an excuse or give up fasting on account of it, for even those who do not fast often fall into the same or more grievous diseases. If you have begun something good, do not desist from it just because the Enemy thwarts you through illness; let him, rather, be foiled through your patient endurance.”
St. Synkletike
'Abba Isaiah was once visited by a certain brother. The Abba washed the brother’s feet, afterwards putting a handful of lentils into a pot and lighting a fire. When the water began to boil, Abba Isaiah took the pot off the fire. “Abba,” said the brother, “the lentils are not cooked yet.” And he replied, “Is it not enough for you that you have seen the fire? This, too, is a consolation.”
'Abba Achillas once visited Abba Isaih and found him eating. he had put salt and water on his plate, which he hid behind some plaited palm branches when he noticed Abba Achillas coming towards him. As later events proved, he did this out of a spirit of dispensation, so as to avoid scandalizing his visitor; for such a custom did not prevail in Sketis.
Now, when Abba Achillas found him chewing, without there being anything in front of him, he said to him: “Tell me, what were you eating?” “Forgive me,” replied Abba Isaiah, “I was cutting palm branches in the heat, and when I came to eat I put bread with salt into my mouth; but the bread did not go down, because my throat was parched from the heat. For this reason, I was compelled to put water on the salt, so as to satisfy my need for sustenance; but forgive me.”
Abba Achillas then said: “Come and see Isaiah eating soup in Sketis; if you want to eat soup, go to Egypt.”
- from the sayings of the desert fathers
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thomasf
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I often go for most of the day without eating until 3pmish, where I eat a small meal, and that’s it for the rest of the day. I have to eat something or my blood sugar drops and I’m unbearable. Usually do this in the summer when it’s hot.
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Thomas_Casey
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I merged three threads on the same subject. Please do not start a thread on a subject when another is running.
Thank You
Thank You
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tee_eff_em
Guest
[GeezerAlert]
Would not a Wimpy fast consist of eating nothing but hamburgers?
[/GeezerAlert]
tee
Who would gladly pay you Tuesday for a hamburger today
Would not a Wimpy fast consist of eating nothing but hamburgers?
[/GeezerAlert]
tee
Who would gladly pay you Tuesday for a hamburger today
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agapewolf
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mattkubes
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Haven’t the smaller meals always been called collations? That’s just the french for “snack.” It may have been translated as “meal,” but that’s the traditional idea behind them.
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Phemie
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In post # 39, JM3 posted the rule from 1966’s Apostolic Constitution "Paenitemini" of the Supreme Pontiff Paul VI on Fast and Abstinence which is in effect today and which says “2. The law of fasting allows only one full meal a day, but does not prohibit taking some food in the morning and evening, observing—as far as quantity and quality are concerned—approved local custom.”
The French translation speaks also of ‘taking a bit of food’, it doesn’t call it a collation.
I suspect that it’s written that way because in Europe the main meal is taken at lunch time. In North America I think most of us eat our main meal at supper with our families – while that timing is perhaps not as good for our health, a 30 minute lunch break when you’re working is not conducive to having your main meal then.
On fast days DH and I eat our full meal at suppertime, between 5 & 7 depending on the Mass schedule, and if I need to I’ll usually have a bite of something around 10:30 a.m. DH is diabetic and 62 so not bound by the fasting rule.
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Phemie
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I think you misread that bulletin. It says “But in our liturgy, the church thinks about the Last Supper not as the last thing that happened on Holy Thursday, but as the first thing to happen on Good Friday”.
While our legal fast is from 00:00:00-23:59:59 on Friday, Good Friday starts with sundown on Holy Thursday and the thee Triduum days are Good Friday, Holy Saturday and Easter Sunday.
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tee_eff_em
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Disagree: The Triduum begins with the Mass of the Lord’s Supper and ends with the Easter Vigil – Thursday, Friday and Saturday.
Easter Sunday is not part of the Triduum.
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Phemie
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Not according to Paschale Solemnitatis. The Triduum starts with the Mass of the Lord’s Supper and ends with vespers on Easter Sunday.
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malphono
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I think both are correct, each in its own context.
IIRC, in the EF the Triduum is considered as Tee suggests. In the Novus Ordo, however, it’s as Phemie suggests (I don’t have the Missal at hand, but it does have an heading “Sacred Triduum” on Holy Thursday, after the Chrism Mass and before the Mass of the Lord’s Supper). Paschale Solemnitatis, of course, was written in accordance with the Novus Ordo reckoning.
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tee_eff_em
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I am corrected.
Easter Sunday is reckoned as both part of the Triduum and of the Easter Season.
tee
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3DOCTORS
Guest
This is a point I’ve often wondered about. My eating pattern can vary widely and sometimes I’m dieting - and on the other hand, I can also get low blood sugars. I’m insulin resistant, btw, though I wondered about this long before I was diagnosed. When I was still working, if I got low in my blood sugar I would get mentally foggy and very irritable. Sometimes I would get anxiety. Sleeping was one way to endure; I’d go to bed early - and sometimes at midnight I would eat if I was awake. Wimpy? Maybe. Yet I tried to get into the spirit of it as best I could, and I think it’s wonderful that some are able to do it very well. :tiphat:
But it was getting to be this spiritual conflict for me. Finally I went to my confessor and asked for a dispensation (lifetime) that if I found that I needed to fast less strictly, I could choose an alternate penance. Since I’m on disability now, and don’t have to slog through an 8-hour stressful work day, I can somewhat survive the fast, but other times I still have to invoke the dispensation and do some extra prayer or charitable work. Especially if I’m going to be around people; I think it’s better to avoid the irritability that would be an occasion of sin.
That’s just my situation, and though it’s another year till we’ll need to think about this again, I just thought I’d share it. We can all pray and strive to do better - it’s not always easy discerning just how. I think maybe what some posters on this thread have been getting at is that the guidelines are not p(name removed by moderator)ointed down to the minutiae, which would be impossible due to regional and personal and situational variations. So then we do get caught up in that “Is this a sin/not a sin” trap. Maybe that struggle in itself is something we can try to offer up to God.
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