Fasting – from lack to fullness
THE WORD IN LENT 2026 – MONDAY THIRD WEEK
March 09 – 2 Kings 5: 1-15,18-20; Luke 4: 24-30
Fasting is a spiritual exercise that should enable us move from lack to fullness. The danger at times is that our spiritual practices make us either self-righteous spiritual recluses or self-trumpeting identity seekers! This is the sad fact that Jesus wants us to be aware of. We are reminded here to go back to those first three days of this season of lent, when the Word instructed us how our prayer, fasting and charity should be during lent, and what they should lead us towards.
Holy father when he speaks about fasting in his Lenten message of this year, he says “in order to practice fasting in accordance with its evangelical character and avoid the temptation that leads to pride, it must be lived in faith and humility.” There is, therefore, a very close affinity between spiritual practices and humility. The Word today brings out this message in a very concrete event narrated in the first reading and interpretatively referred to by Jesus in the Gospel – it is about Naaman.
Naaman in infuriated – not because Elijah refused to cure him, because he did not; not because Elijah maltreated him or called him names, because that never happened; not because Elijah asked for exorbitant remuneration to carry out the miracle of healing, because that was never a concern for Elijah. Naaman was angry because his ego was offended. He was not disrespected but he ‘felt’ insulted. He was not maltreated but he “felt” he was despised. He felt so, because his heart was hardened with pride and self-glory. His ego of a minister in the courts of the king was so big that he looked at the way Elijah treated him was belittling.
Elijah was clear about his stand – that he was not curing Naaman but the God of Israel was; that he would not want to have anything to do with the great political guest who has come but wanted his king not to despair on account of anyone. Elijah was acting on God’s behalf… and before God Naaman, justifiably, cannot hold on to his haughtiness; but his heart was hardened not to see the truth. Fortunately, a little bit of humility, put into his heart by his servants, brings him to healing, to wholeness, to salvation!
Fasting has to bring us to see the truth, to be grounded – that is to be humble. Humility alone can help us understand the reality of how we keep ourselves away from the healing grace of God, the love and compassion of God that makes us whole. When we move from hardheartedness to humility, we move gradually from lack to fullness.
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Fr Antony Christy is a Salesian Priest from 2005, who has a Masters in Philosophy (specialisation in Religion) and a Masters in Theology (Specialisation in Catechetics). He is currently pursuing his doctoral research in Theology at Salesian Pontifical University, Rome. Walking with the Young towards a World of Peace and Dialogue is the passion that fires him.