One Full Meal, Please
Fasting always sounded to me like a spiritual challenge with a high bar. One person gives up meat, another denies himself sweets, someone else limits the internet or gives up his favourite entertainments. The idea sounds beautiful, but when it comes to putting it into practice… well, that is when the trouble begins.
I am not an ascetic by nature. I admit it. I like good coffee, sweets, and that sense of control over my own time. That is why fasting always confronts me with an uncomfortable question: can I give something up, even for a moment? Sometimes it turns out that what I consider my needs is merely a habit or, worse, a subtle form of slavery.
I remember one of my ambitious strict fasts from my seminary days. I decided to take it seriously: I would eat nothing all day, only dry bread. No snacks, no coffee, no small concessions. I was proud of myself, because after all, the fast was meant to be severe and demanding. The whole day passed in a feeling of victory over myself. But in the evening… well, in the evening I sat down at the table in the refectory and ate two full plates of food, piled so high they were practically overflowing. "After all, one meal to full satisfaction is allowed!" I explained to myself with satisfaction.
This, however, did not escape the attention of my friend Fr Szymon, who said with a smile, but firmly: "Adam, that is not what fasting is about." We began to talk, indeed to argue. Szymon explained to me that fasting is not a clever strategy for cheating the rules, but a way of giving something up: not only food, but above all one's comforts, one's ego, and the conviction that everything must be "my way".
That conversation with Szymek comes back to me every year as Lent approaches. I began to wonder what I had actually been trying to achieve. Is fasting only a matter of enduring hunger and later "rewarding myself" for perseverance? Is it about outwitting myself and the rules?
Szymon was right. That was not a fast. That was a spiritual circumvention of rules which, in theory, were supposed to teach me something. But God is not an accountant who counts exactly how many slices of bread I ate and whether I abstained from supper. Fasting is not about mathematics. It is about something much deeper: inner freedom.
That situation was my first serious collision with the truth that fasting does not consist in scheming how to get around the rules, but in consciously losing something in order to make space for God. That thought stayed firmly in my memory. Because giving something up is hard. It hurts. But it also teaches.
Lent is precisely such a time. We give up comforts, pleasures, sometimes the sense of control over our own lives. But we do not do this in vain. We set these things aside to remind ourselves that we have God, who is the source of true life.
Of course, this losing does not always go perfectly. Sometimes my resolutions fall apart after a few days. "Just one piece of cake," I tell myself, and then I realise it is already the second or third. Or the prayer that was meant to be long and focused suddenly shrinks to a hurried sigh, because I have a thousand things to do running through my head.
But fasting is not a competition in perfection. It is not spiritual "strength training" where only endurance counts. Fasting is a reminder that I do not have to have everything, I do not have to control everything, I do not have to cling desperately to everything.
I am reminded of a meeting with a certain elderly woman from our parish, one of my sick. She was ill and could no longer eat what she had once loved. "Father, I used to think that fasting was just not eating meat. And now I see that true fasting is losing what you do not want to lose: health, plans, sometimes even hope. But that is when you begin to discover that God truly is enough." Her words were like a retreat for me. To this day, I keep them in my spiritual diary.
Setting aside time for prayer, when the world rushes on and demands efficiency, is one of the hardest fasts. Holding back words, when you would love to repay someone with a biting comment, can also be a challenge. Giving up comfort in order to help someone who needs it: all these are small sacrifices that can change the heart.
But these small sacrifices in Lent make sense only when they lead to the discovery of how much we already have. That we have God, who is faithful even when we fail. That we have people around us who are a gift, though we sometimes fail to notice it.
Lent is a time in which we learn to lose control. And yet we love to control. Our plans, our relationships, our time. Even in the spiritual life, we try to keep everything under control: precisely scheduled prayers, specific resolutions, exact calculations of how many times we managed to deny ourselves something.
But God does not at all want me to "please" Him with a list of ticked-off sacrifices. He wants to be in the emptiness that arises when I lose something. When I stop burying my life in noise, food, and entertainment, and suddenly feel… a lack. And with that lack comes space. Space to notice God.
So if your fast has already "fallen apart" more than once, like my crumbs on that legendary seminary plate of mine: do not worry. Perhaps right now God wants to teach you that you do not have to be perfect. Perhaps one act of letting go of control or of complaining will be the true fast that bears fruit. Because losing, though hard, always leads to the discovery that we have more than we think. We have God. And that truly is enough.
Fr Adam Płonka
I am not an ascetic by nature. I admit it. I like good coffee, sweets, and that sense of control over my own time. That is why fasting always confronts me with an uncomfortable question: can I give something up, even for a moment? Sometimes it turns out that what I consider my needs is merely a habit or, worse, a subtle form of slavery.
I remember one of my ambitious strict fasts from my seminary days. I decided to take it seriously: I would eat nothing all day, only dry bread. No snacks, no coffee, no small concessions. I was proud of myself, because after all, the fast was meant to be severe and demanding. The whole day passed in a feeling of victory over myself. But in the evening… well, in the evening I sat down at the table in the refectory and ate two full plates of food, piled so high they were practically overflowing. "After all, one meal to full satisfaction is allowed!" I explained to myself with satisfaction.
This, however, did not escape the attention of my friend Fr Szymon, who said with a smile, but firmly: "Adam, that is not what fasting is about." We began to talk, indeed to argue. Szymon explained to me that fasting is not a clever strategy for cheating the rules, but a way of giving something up: not only food, but above all one's comforts, one's ego, and the conviction that everything must be "my way".
That conversation with Szymek comes back to me every year as Lent approaches. I began to wonder what I had actually been trying to achieve. Is fasting only a matter of enduring hunger and later "rewarding myself" for perseverance? Is it about outwitting myself and the rules?
Szymon was right. That was not a fast. That was a spiritual circumvention of rules which, in theory, were supposed to teach me something. But God is not an accountant who counts exactly how many slices of bread I ate and whether I abstained from supper. Fasting is not about mathematics. It is about something much deeper: inner freedom.
That situation was my first serious collision with the truth that fasting does not consist in scheming how to get around the rules, but in consciously losing something in order to make space for God. That thought stayed firmly in my memory. Because giving something up is hard. It hurts. But it also teaches.
Lent is precisely such a time. We give up comforts, pleasures, sometimes the sense of control over our own lives. But we do not do this in vain. We set these things aside to remind ourselves that we have God, who is the source of true life.
Of course, this losing does not always go perfectly. Sometimes my resolutions fall apart after a few days. "Just one piece of cake," I tell myself, and then I realise it is already the second or third. Or the prayer that was meant to be long and focused suddenly shrinks to a hurried sigh, because I have a thousand things to do running through my head.
But fasting is not a competition in perfection. It is not spiritual "strength training" where only endurance counts. Fasting is a reminder that I do not have to have everything, I do not have to control everything, I do not have to cling desperately to everything.
I am reminded of a meeting with a certain elderly woman from our parish, one of my sick. She was ill and could no longer eat what she had once loved. "Father, I used to think that fasting was just not eating meat. And now I see that true fasting is losing what you do not want to lose: health, plans, sometimes even hope. But that is when you begin to discover that God truly is enough." Her words were like a retreat for me. To this day, I keep them in my spiritual diary.
Setting aside time for prayer, when the world rushes on and demands efficiency, is one of the hardest fasts. Holding back words, when you would love to repay someone with a biting comment, can also be a challenge. Giving up comfort in order to help someone who needs it: all these are small sacrifices that can change the heart.
But these small sacrifices in Lent make sense only when they lead to the discovery of how much we already have. That we have God, who is faithful even when we fail. That we have people around us who are a gift, though we sometimes fail to notice it.
Lent is a time in which we learn to lose control. And yet we love to control. Our plans, our relationships, our time. Even in the spiritual life, we try to keep everything under control: precisely scheduled prayers, specific resolutions, exact calculations of how many times we managed to deny ourselves something.
But God does not at all want me to "please" Him with a list of ticked-off sacrifices. He wants to be in the emptiness that arises when I lose something. When I stop burying my life in noise, food, and entertainment, and suddenly feel… a lack. And with that lack comes space. Space to notice God.
So if your fast has already "fallen apart" more than once, like my crumbs on that legendary seminary plate of mine: do not worry. Perhaps right now God wants to teach you that you do not have to be perfect. Perhaps one act of letting go of control or of complaining will be the true fast that bears fruit. Because losing, though hard, always leads to the discovery that we have more than we think. We have God. And that truly is enough.
Fr Adam Płonka
