Catholic Lent 2022! (Fasting for Catholics in Lent and what to give up!)

hello everyone in this video we're going to be doing a quick talk about lent and some ideas for lent to have the best lent ever the most productive lent ever because many times we go through lent but we start and end the same way we don't really grow in holiness we don't really grow close to christ and there are reasons why this is so so in this video we're going to be giving you some really good ideas for lent that maybe you can work on or that maybe you can give up or do and a little bit about lent itself right after that [Music] hello everyone welcome to catholic truth your place to know love and live your catholic faith and to know exactly what the catholic church teaches and why in this video we're going to be talking about lent i mean lent comes simply from matthew chapter 4 in the bible where jesus went out into the desert for 40 days and 40 nights before he started his public ministry he went to empty himself of everything and to pray and to fast before the father and so that is what we base lent on we in a sense go out into the desert and we give up things we empty ourselves of those things that do not belong to god or that keep us from god or are hurting our relationship with god and we pray more we fast more and we give alms more those are the three requirements of the church for lent so we're giving up these things and we're giving ourselves more to jesus giving up something like candy or tv or coffee giving up things is not a requirement prayer more prayer is a requirement more fasting is a requirement and some of that's built in and giving alms more and giving back to god more through alms giving that those are the requirements of lent we're not required necessarily to give something up but since it is about coming closer to god it is about growing in holiness most of us want to give up something that doesn't bring us closer to god or that we need to work on or discipline ourselves in some way and we're going to give you a few examples of that in a minute but the bottom line is that lent is supposed to help us to go out and find christ more to prepare us and our souls for death so that by the end of lent we should be in a better place than when we started we should be closer to jesus we should be holier and we should be working on our issues in the spiritual life removing those sins or those things that keep us from god and creating disciplines that help us come closer to god i mean for many lents i gave up candy you know every day for 40 days i gave up candy and then at the end of the 40 days i had saved all my candy and i binged on it i ate it all after lent so i really didn't learn anything i didn't get anything out of it i just went back to the same gluttony that i had before lent same thing with other things in my life if i gave up soda i would drink a lot of soda after lent to make up for it and so these things were not actually making me holier these things were not bringing me closer to jesus and it's not bad to give up candy if you want to but is it making you holier or are you just doing it because it's it's difficult and you want to create a discipline that's not a bad thing either when most people hear lent they're not like yes lent's here yes i'm so excited i've been waiting all year for lent usually people's expressions are like oh it's lent oh it's lent and so this is how we feel about lent because it's it's a lot of times darkest a lot of times depressing it's a lot of times difficult because we have to die to ourselves and that's difficult so one way i've uh learned to counter that is not to kill myself during lent not to give up everything i can think of like five different things and many people do this they make all these penances they give up like five things they they're gonna pray for an hour extra a day already and more than they already were and they don't even last a week and they don't get anything done they end up giving up so we want to make goals that are practical and we want to give up things that are practical so for lent here's what i do now usually i give up something so i can discipline myself and i actually work on something i work on a sin or i work on an imperfection i work on a bad habit so that i'm in a better place at the end of life and i'm a better person and closer to god just as a stupid example i like to play video games there i admitted it i like to play video games and sometimes i play too much in the past same thing with music i love music and in the past you know i've given up music and as soon as lent's over i'm back to listening to music in the car in my room on my computer anywhere in every room i just listen to music everywhere and it took me three lengths in a row of giving up music to break that addiction of having to listen to music everywhere i go and i was able to listen to it in moderation same thing with video games i used to give it up and then as soon as it was over i needed to make up for the last time so i started playing endless amounts of video games and i decided to do something different a couple years ago which really helped me i decided to learn to do things in moderation instead of just giving up video games completely i actually was only allowed to play two days a week and those two days a week the next day i wanted to play but i couldn't and then the next day maybe i could and then the day after that i couldn't but so it taught me to do everything in moderation i enjoyed it but i enjoyed it in the right amount same thing with social media maybe social media is your vice maybe you scroll for hours and hours and hours and hours and you want to cut that down so you can spend more time in prayer so you can spend more time reading the bible so you can spend more time talking to people and doing things that are actually important in life not just scrolling hours of the news or snapchat or whatnot if we give these up we have more time for christ now i'm not saying give it up cold turkey but what if you did social media three days a week or what if you did it every day but you only limited yourself to 15 minutes so this is hard it's going to be difficult but you're so you're allowed to do social media but you're teaching yourself a lifelong needed lesson to do it in moderation the most important thing to do is to start at the top if we have an addiction to something we want to work on that we want to fight that during lent we want to make progress on it i've had addictions and i've had stuff that i need to work on and even just something like maybe um not gossiping let's just say and i usually gossip but through lent i start working on it and i tame my tongue and i don't speak i don't talk bad about others behind their back and maybe i'm not perfect by the end of lent but i'm in a better place i started doing that a few years ago and i was so happy with how i came closer to christ and got rid of these things that were displeasing to christ that i kept going after lent i was like i don't want to stop i'm going to work on this until christmas so that i can hopefully root it out of my life and then the next year when that comes around i'll choose something else and work on that so we don't have to stop at the end of lent if we want to do something to work on but if you struggle with lust or porn or anger or anything like that maybe gossip maybe laziness and sloth maybe overworking maybe social media whatever your struggle is your addiction is whatever keeps you from christ that's what we need to work on maybe you don't pray at all that is what you need to work on you need to develop a good prayer life every single day during lent rosary bible reading liturgy of the hours whatever you need to get a good relationship with jesus christ that is number one jesus doesn't want you to give up candy or coffee if you don't have a prayer life he would much rather you have a prayer life and have a good relationship with him than to give up candy or coffee and he would much rather have you work on gossip or work on your temper or work on you know not you know yelling at your kids all the time and controlling that anger rather than say giving up chocolate or giving up you know your favorite sweet or soda or something like that those aren't necessarily bad but one is infinitely more important than the other these things these fastings like candy soda and stuff these can help us to get grace you know every time we're struggling oh i really want that coffee and i can't have it okay i'm going to offer it up so i can overcome this or i'm going to offer it up for this vice or i'm going to offer it up so i can come closer to jesus i'm going to offer up this for what i'm struggling with so giving up things is good it creates a discipline you can offer things up you can get grace but working on something is equally important or more important when jesus went out into the desert he was free already from everything and yet he went out there and completely emptied himself for the father he completely gave himself to the father in prayer and in fasting and so that is what we need to do look at your life sit down tonight really take time to sit down and say what is keeping me from god what is that obstacle or that block in my life that is preventing me from coming closer to god like i want to maybe it's i just watch tv all the time and i don't have time to pray maybe it's i listen to music all the time and i don't have time to help others or serve the poor or do other things that god calls me to do or call my family or build actual relationships is which is why we're on this earth in the first place there's many things in different people's lives that they struggle with or that we've gotten the bad habits so this lent you're called to empty yourself to give up things that are obstacles to your spiritual life and to give yourself more to jesus throw yourself into it if you were going to die at the end of lent would you be ready if you were going to die tonight would you be ready and if not and god gave you 40 more days to live what would you want to work on in those 40 days to make sure that you came to the very heart of jesus that you made sure that you were going to go to heaven that you made sure that you were going to come closer to christ and overcome those things that are obstacles to salvation so again i'm not saying necessarily give up all your music you can i'm not saying give up netflix throughout all of lent and tv and entertainment you can but what if we gave up music three days a week four days a week or what if we only allowed ourselves to watch uh movies or netflix three days a week no don't replace one addiction with another oh i can't watch netflix tonight so i'm just gonna go spend all night online i'm just gonna go watch all youtube videos no don't replace one addiction with another give up these things and spend it quality time talking to others building building relationships maybe having game nights with your family maybe going out to eat with you know spending a lot of time with your family maybe making a night uh where you find a church that has confession and go to confession but spend time trying to come closer to god praying the stations of the cross whatever it is but make this your best lent ever as if you were going to die at the end of lent make it amazing thank you so much for watching this video i hope that some of these things helped you i really hope that you take time to reflect on what you need to work on and where you need to go and what jesus is calling you to ask the holy spirit lord what do i need to work on what are you calling me to ask the holy spirit for enlightenment for guidance for help for counsel and please if you like this video then like it and if you love this video then please subscribe to our channel where you'll find many more videos that will help you grow in your faith defend your faith and love your faith and please leave a comment down below if you have any suggestions for lent i would like to hear them i'm sure other people would like to hear them please leave your comments down below and if you have any questions let us know that too but thanks so much for watching and god bless you hi everyone my name is kate i'm the video editor here at catholic truth and i just wanted to say on behalf of all of us thank you so much for taking some time to watch our videos and learn more about your faith you guys really make this channel possible and we truly appreciate you being here so thanks again and god bless

Channel: Catholic Truth

Views: 7,573

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Id: VHsl3kL3O5g

Length: 12min 9sec (729 seconds)

Published: Tue Mar 01 2022