PEOPLE diet to lose weight and to look better. But judging from the evidence, it often doesn’t work. Perhaps they are dieting from the wrong motives. In a spiritual fast, one learns to control the appetite — not for any worldly gain but for other-worldly gain.  The spiritual fast strengthens the will. The modern world needs fasting and abstinence more than ever:

But, alas! the generality of men consider these observances as duties incumbent indeed on persons in a retired or religious state, but wholly inapplicable to those, who take an active part on the theatre of the world. In opposition to this so fatal an error, I assert, that the practice of penance is, to persons in the world, above all others, of the most imperative obligation. The man of contemplation might possibly find, in the constant meditation of the truths of eternity, in the undisturbed application of his mind to prayer and celestial things, in the sacred and sublime occupations of his state, wherewith to combat his inordinate appetites. In the world, on the contrary, all things tend to excite and augment their violence. In the world, besides the evil propensities of nature, you have to struggle against the force of general example, against the seductions of pleasure, artfully decked out in its most attractive garb to enchant and captivate. There the passions are soothed and flattered; there virtue is without honour; there vicious indulgence, in almost all its shapes, is excused, in many is even applauded. In the world, then, the practice of self-denial is of the first necessity; there, if you are not mortified, your ruin is inevitable.

Read more on “The Necessity of Mortification.”

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