Holiday Fasting Perspective

One of the common Christian practices is fasting. People practice fasting especially before the great Christian holidays of Easter and Christmas. So since the fasting time has already started, at least in the Orthodox and Catholic traditions, maybe this would be useful for those who want both to do their Christian duty, and to preserve their good health. Fasting has been practiced in many cultures, in fact, and ever since ancient times. The basic idea is not to do it out of spiritual vanity, or to impress others, but in order to achieve a deeper understanding of what God wants us to be like. As a fragment from the Bible says, God appreciates goodness of heart, one’s love towards the other people and towards the entire creation, good deeds and a compassionate, humble heart more than any fasting and sacrifice humans can do.

Even if fasting is considered to be a great method for purifying both our body, and our spirit, if we are not careful of what we eat in this period, our organism may have to suffer. There is certain advice that should be taken into account before engaging on a Christmas fasting that we can keep without any fear of health problems or any other kind of deficiencies.

First, we must know that not everybody is allowed to fast. There are some medical problems that may prevent some of us from doing that, and doctors advise such persons as breastfeeding mums, children, people suffering from the nephritic syndrome, people with chronic diseases, the immune depressed, people suffering from malnutrition and those that are in convalescence, to simply avoid any kind of fasting. Then, as far as children are concerned, if their parents insist they should be fasting, they should bear in mind the fasting duration should under no circumstance exceed four days. During the fasting time, children are deprived from animal proteins and, if this happens over a longer time span, it can develop into a disorder of the growing hormones, which depend on the essential amino acids that can be found in meat. Teenagers shouldn’t follow any strict form of fasting, either. Teenage is the time when the neuro hormonal changes take place. In their case, the fasting period should not exceed six days.

As far as adults are concerned, if the person who fasts has a rather fragile constitution, but still wants to go through this bodily and spiritual purification period, it is advisable for that person to have a less strict kind of fasting. Thus, such a person is recommended to eat at least 150 grams of meat every four days and, if possible, not to give up using milk and milky products which can supplement for the lack of meat proteins. At the same time, after the fasting period is over, it’s very important to restart with a mixed, well-balanced eating, without any sudden meat abuse, because the digestive system and the entire metabolism cannot readjust too easily, and certain digestive problems may appear. In addition to that, after a very long fasting, it is advisable to drink a lot of mineral water. The salts contained by the mineral water can hurry the process of restoring amino acids and increase the efficiency of their absorption into foods.

Also, for people who are older than 54, the fasting period should not exceed five days and the post-fasting eating habits are crucial for restoring the level of amino acids. It is advisable for such persons to drink sour mile after the fasting, at least 200 ml/day, because the sour taste is likely to stimulate the fast absorption of essential amino acids. For lunch, they may have meat soups with plenty of sour milk.

On the psychological level, fasting can make some people irritable, fussy and moody. This is generally caused by our limited human perspective. But when we do realize fasting was not initially our own idea, but God’s, and that it can only be done relying on God’s power and grace, and only to serve His purposes, not to feed our vain egos, the really desired effects of this spiritual practice can finally appear: our spirit is refreshed, more powerful, we get more loving, compassionate and understanding towards one another, closer to God.