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Posted by Robyn Lee in Faith on Tuesday, March 09, 2010 3:30 PM
I went over to my sister’s the other day and I noticed the kids’ Lenten calendars on the fridge. I glanced over the daily resolutions.
Handwritten, in each box were little sacrifices or good works: write letter to Pat, no Wii, make my bed, no computer, draw Aunt Robyn a picture (like the one shown here by my niece Fiona).
It reminded me of Lent growing up in my house.
Mom didn’t make dessert very often, but if someone gave up dessert we had a sweet every night.
If I wrote “no popcorn” on my Lenten calendar my mom made sure to make popcorn on that day. Recently when I asked my mom about it she said, “I wanted to make sure it was a sacrifice for you kids.”
My mom is hardcore.
Now as an adult I try to strengthen the will by giving up sweets or a favorite caffeine beverage (no more upside down caramel macchiatos!), but recently I heard a homily about giving up or working on the thing that prevents us from loving.
Huh? I thought I just needed to give up coffee, but taking to heart what that priest said, I started paying attention to the different relationships in my life. I tried to examine the ways people give and show love. I learned that relationships with friends, roommates, or even coworkers take work and extra attention.
Somehow that seems much harder than giving up my daily cup o’ joe.
Every year my Lenten resolutions are centered around fasting and I forget to consider almsgiving or developing my prayer life.
What about you? Do you focus on one of the Lenten pillars? What are you doing this Lent to increase your prayer life or work with the needy?
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THat is a good challenge. I am trying to be a better wife and mother. I get frustrated sometimes with all of the things I need to get done and I forget that part of my vocation is to do these things (sacrifices) out of love for my family. So I guess in short, I’m working on my attitude. As well as trying to add at least one of the Daily Office prayers to each day.
First, I am taking a lesson from your mom! I love it! I need to write this down so next year we do the calendar thing and I can popcorn on those days. 
This year I took it a bit easy. I didn’t really give up anything except browsing knitting patterns online. But I am working more on my relationship with my awesome kiddos—smiling, being pleasant, speaking nicely. I am reading a book by Dr R. Gaurendi (good stuff!). I am doing other things as well, but it is more of attitude and doing things rather than giving up.
Your mom still makes us work hard. I gave up dessert this year and one night she made TRIFLE! Nancy tried to convince us to eat it because it was the eve of Sunday, but we told her that might be taking the Sunday rule a bit too far. I have also been trying to work on putting my burden on God more than I have been doing this year. Praying more and relying more that God will work out situations in the way it should be worked out. We are so lucky that your mom cares so much about our sacrifices. We should find out what she gave up and help her.
We make our calendars color coded to represent prayer, fasting and almsgiving (on almsgiving days they do chores to earn money for the poor). However, I think we need to fill them in with actual activities like Alison does because we have missed some days. And I gave up computer time and various treats, but am really trying to focus on making extra holy hours and spiritual reading—especially, Consoling the Heart of Jesus by Br. Mike Gaitely. Oh and Colleen… the Church starts celebrating Solemnities on the “Eve of.” Whether or not she is advocating doing that with dessert is definitely a personal choice.
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