Fasting in Lent

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Mar 25, 1903

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 29, No. 12.

Fasting in Lent.—In speaking of Roman Catholic lenten diet, Dr. Buckley, of the Christian Advocate, remarks: “If people would live for the rest of their lives according to the rules laid down by the Roman Catholic authority of this city, unless sick and needing a special diet, the average duration of human life would be greatly lengthened, and the public health much improved. . . . We long since discovered that, apart from the effects on the mind and the morals, more evils are produced by gluttony, hasty eating, eating between meals, and having the times of meals too near together, than by the use of ardent spirits in any degree compatible with the continuance of life. No human being needs more than one square meal a day. People may be healthy therewith, unless doing a vast amount of hard manual labor. But fasting in Lent as distinguished from other periods is a yoke imposed by man, obligatory only on those who believe that the persons who impose it have a commission from God.” And he speaks truly: we have proved it.