As more Catholics find themselves in a culture increasingly promising mastery over the body, few traditional practices find themselves more countercultural than voluntarily depriving ourselves of our abundance, most commonly through fasting.

Yet across centuries, the faithful have discovered that the very hunger they feel brings to life something that modern technology continues to struggle with — facilitating a deeper union with Christ.

Fasting as a practice is something more than skipping meals or enforcing self-denial. At its core, it is about bodily discipline for the purpose of reordering desire. As we hunger, rooted in Scripture, practised by Jesus Himself and woven into the Church’s life from the earliest centuries, fasting has long served as a rhythm of dying and rising with Christ and an embodied way of welcoming the Holy Spirit while participating more fully in the life of the Trinity.

Advertisement

Moreover, the practice itself is historically and liturgically important to the Catholic faith. Many know that both Ash Wednesday and Good Friday are obligatory days of fasting and abstinence for Catholics, and Fridays during Lent are also considered obligatory days of abstinence. Some may even recall that the 1983 Code of Canon Law, no. 919, states that whoever is to receive the blessed Eucharist must abstain for at least one hour before Holy Communion from all food and drink, with the sole exception of water and medicine.

In August, a small group of students in Halifax will step into those ancient practices again. For 14 days, they will fast in preparation for the Feast of the Dormition and Assumption of Mary. A ritual typically observed by many Orthodox and Eastern Catholic Christian traditions, Holy Cross Chaplaincy’s Dormition Fast will run from Aug. 1 to 14.

James Pereira, the program coordinator at Holy Cross, told The Catholic Register that he and his team brought the tradition into focus to offer students a compelling summer communal practice.

“ I think (fasting) ties back into some of the broader philosophy behind our ministry at the chaplaincy toward forming students to Christ-likeness. Sometimes that means sitting them down with a book study and having a discussion, which is great, but we also want to train students in the Christian life through the classical disciplines, fasting being a truly important one,” he said. 

“If we can bring some of the interest back, not just through hosting a talk about fasting in the chaplaincy, but actually doing it together, it is a great way to show that this is a special, regular part of the calendar in the Christian tradition.” 

In addition, daily poetry will be sent to participants as a means of providing theological reflection as a positive replacement to mere food restriction. Pereira is also bringing some unique Maritime adaptations to the offering, including a “blessing of the seas” out of the old Italian Assumption tradition as well as a closing “kitchen party” and feast for added fellowship and celebration after the fast concludes. 

Thinking about the events’ existence is Dr. David Deane, the associate professor of theology at the Atlantic School of Theology in Halifax. As he reflected, Deane spoke to the many theological foundations on which fasting is predicated, firstly towards its nature as something relational and ontological. 

“The modern West disastrously encourages us to think about the moral life as a set of things you do to appease a distant God who will judge and score us out of 10 for every action. The reality is that moral life is about how, in turning the other cheek, giving to the poor and praying, we are accepting the Holy Spirit who conforms us to Jesus Christ and who is in God the Father,” he said. 

“This is the case in fasting. How can we know Christ, who was hungry and was fed? How can we know the light? And how can we re-enchant creation?  When we are hungry, we come to thank God when that hunger is broken. This is why the traditional harvest was always religious in nature.” 

Advertisement

Interestingly, with the current trends around modern biohacking or other measurable, shortcut approaches, fasting with piety today holds an even deeper meaning by its very nature. 

“ We're at a stage now where you have drugs like Ozempic and many others, which work at the level of desire — what is it doing to the morality of (our decisions)?” Deane asks. 

If we could take a drug that would make us care about the poor, or never naturally be able to turn the other cheek or whatever, what would that mean for us theologically? 

“Arriving at the goal in that way is not that simple. It’s not that we are to just eat in a certain way. The goal is that we become one with the Son, Jesus Christ, through the Holy Spirit.”

It remains a practice tied to active participation in Christ’s life, death and resurrection, a reality Deane believes begins with a certain transformative Biblical “knowing.”

“ When we reduce the world to what's measurable and quantifiable, then we lose the perspective  of how an experience shapes someone’s relationship with Jesus Christ. When fasting becomes about measurable things like health and self-control,  we lose the transformative and transubstantive quality embodied in fasting as a 'participation' in Christ and the graces of the Holy Spirit,” Deane said. 

While forgetting to eat breakfast and lunch each day technically counts as fasting, the entire purpose is lost when the knowledge behind the “why” is lost too.  Much like how the Stations of the Cross are not simply a morbid fixation on Christ's suffering, but rather the reality that through said sufferings we can come to experience and know Christ’s love, fasting allows for this realization, too, said Deane. 

Apart from its many theological implications, Pereira believes the practical aspects of a fast, one done in the communal sense, still has a place in modern society. 

“ When I started practising fasting with my community regularly on Fridays, I felt so tied to Sunday. In a way, we can experience that mini-Triduum arc every single weekend if on Fridays we die with Christ, and on Sundays we celebrate His resurrection,” he said. 

It is that tangibility — something unique to a practice that can affect mind, body and spirit — Pereira hopes can be made ordinary to those who participate. 

Both men hope that, while the tradition has become something of a “lost art” due to society’s collective loss of the classical Christian understanding, paired with obscene modern abundance and comfort, first-timers and veterans alike will soon be able to experience fasting as a participatory, transformative and hope-filled practice rather than an outdated and optional one. 

Advertisement

For Deane, that experience begins with proper education on what it truly means to fast with intention. 

“It’s really important now that kids are attempting to fast again because it sounds hardcore. Only in knowing the beauty of how it can transform your relationship with the Trinity and transform your life can the next generation actually have this supercharged experience that is truly transformative, rather than just one more biohack or challenge to check off a list,” he said.